lukeoutbelow | Do not be afraid of light

Do not be afraid of light

They smelled the battlefield long before they saw it. The apprentices and little Sisters who hadn't been on this kind of excursion before covered their noses and exclaimed. Vena didn't. As the child of a camp follower she would know to expect this, but her tread slowed and she looked repeatedly at Sister Lashan, especially as the sound of incredible numbers of crows cawing grew louder.

"Nasty, isn't it? Decay is part of death which is part of life," Lashan said firmly, if not totally without sympathy. How young had she been, the last time she was upset by the aftermath of battle? "There's armies that immediately turn around and sort the living from the dying from the dead and take care of that then and there. Not here, they're leaving it for the locals to handle or not and we're local enough. If you fight, you may well fight for people who'll leave you if you fall and move on. Make sure you at least have friends who'll look for you." They pressed on with their wagon. The donkey put its ears back but did not balk.

It wasn't as bad as it would get over the next few days. The bodies - it was now academic who had belonged to which side of whichever meaningless conflict this was - were not much bloated and decayed yet. Flies were not yet overwhelming. Right now the field of bodies was mostly attended by carrion birds, and various other birds that were willing to take advantage of the bounty before them. Finches among them, tiny beaks dipped red. A few other people could be seen picking their way across what had been a perfectly useable pasture. They kept clear. Lashan tasked girls to keep watch for them anyway, pretended not to see the ones who were being sick, and oversaw as dead men were loaded onto the donkeycart. They'd take them away a distance, say the rites, strip them of useful things, get them buried, and come back.

She paused. Something... like a sound. Not a sound. Lashan was hearing something with her mind, closer than the pickers. A threat? She stood like a sentinel and paid attention.

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"The old lady stitched me up pretty good. Just gotta keep it clean so that doesn't happen."

Vena sure knows how to pick the topic of conversation, doesn’t she? Guts keeps at it, having seen enough rotting wounds not to balk at the story. With all the disgusting things that came with line of work, there was some fastidiousness required to avoid being taken out by a single cut. That, and perhaps a bit of luck.

Once his wound is cleansed of old blood, he adds a new poultice he picked out himself, and sets it in place with fresh strips of linen. The positioning was a little awkward, but he makes use of his teeth to hold the other end, and from there, secures it firmly to his body.

"The hell are you talkin' about? Turning nice?" he makes a face as he glances at Vena. He was not nice!

Edited 2022-06-29 02:24 (UTC)

She can hold out new bandages, anyway, and put back the rejected poultices in basically the right places. Wound care is not her forte but if it's not festering like she described she's fine. And it's not gonna fester. The Sisters don't let wounds get infected, even when they don't go as far as pouring magic energy into them to make them heal faster.

Vena rolls her eyes. "Nice-er, whatever. I know you're still a big jerk. You know perfectly well what I mean."

Assistance with the bandages is accepted, albeit still with a little hesitance. Two tiny hands worked much better than his teeth. Though, she might notice an almost involuntary stiffness in his limb if they touch each other directly too much.

"Why would I fight someone who's offering food and a bed? It ain't that complicated."

At least, Guts doesn't doesn't want it to be. He doesn't want to mull too much over how this place felt different than the others, and not just because of all the women around.

Some touching is just going to have to happen, but Vena does notice and refrains from bracing her elbows or the heels of her hands on him even when that would make it easier. "I don't know how tight is too tight so you're just gonna have to tell me," she decides, not having ever taken a shoulder wound herself. It's a more awkward place than an arm or a leg.

"So it's because master took you home? She wants you to fight bandits, but she doesn't think they're really bandits. If Heshain paid them and also paid you are they your friends? No one's gone in the woods because we know they're around, so no one's really hunting and there's not much meat."

One of the nicer things about living way out here is no lords and associated laws keeping the more inclined Sisters from hunting game. They don't eat much beef, having only so many cattle and those dedicated to pulling things and producing milk, and the chickens and geese only sometimes, and the pork is almost out by now, but usually in the summer there's a meal with some rabbit or venison or pheasant almost every day.

Edited 2022-06-29 04:32 (UTC)

"Whatever company that bastard hired out still owes me a month's worth of pay," he growls with irritation. Guts doesn't deny that they have a relationship, but it was more transactional than friendly. His interest in his employers started and stopped with the job, and he didn't get paid til after he came back to collect. Being kidnapped from the battlefield put a stopper to that one, obviously.

"Hope the old lady's made good progress on fixin' up my sword, cause it won't be of much use cutting down bandits in the state it's in."

He has not commented yet on the bandages, but stays still for Vena, so she must be wrapping them just right. He can tolerate the necessary touching, and the sooner they get to breakfast the better.

"It's been two days! And she's old! In the spring she killed this creepy guy who was someone's husband an' sniffing around - he had armor but she did a big overhead cut! And he was almost in two 'cause of she found a gap! - and it messed up her shoulder for weeks. So it's kinda like that again, and gotta be mostly her strikers working on it, and she supervises." The girl is very cheerful about this.

"There," she says, and pats at the air near his shoulder without actually connecting, then dusts her hands off ostentatiously. Vena does not get down off the chair yet. It's novel and kind of fun to be closer to eye level and if she doesn't have a reason not to do something fun, she will do it. "Do you want me to bring you something or can you go out and get stared at?"

She will take longer than necessary if sent out to get breakfast, because her friends are around and it'd be hard to ignore them.

Well, Guts is glad he was getting food instead of having his head split open in the most embarassing death he can imagine for himself. How Lashan managed to fend him off when she shuffled around on a cane in the village was still an utter mystery.

"Thanks..."

He tests the bandages with his opposite hand. Everything felt pretty snug. Now he just has to avoid bleeding through them again. Ugh, resting up was such a pain!

"I can pick up my food. I don't care if people stare at me."

Half-true. It did bother him a bit, but like hell he was going to let a bunch of gawking village girls intimidate him. Absolutely not.

Lashan doesn't always need a stick. She's needed it more often since Vena came back with her to the compound a few years ago. It's a little worrying to think of the big Sister getting older. Vena does not let this on.

"Okay. Come on, this way!" Now she hops down and starts off. It's a little bit chilly outside but the air is fresh and smells like damp earth and pine, and somewhat of bread. Helpfully, Vena adds over her shoulder, "Some of it's 'cause we don't have boys so we almost only see them when we go out somewhere. You look weird."

“I look weird, huh?”

When they step outside the infirmary, Guts gives a big, lazy yawn. He stretches his arms well over his head, a little gentler with the injured shoulder.

“Maybe it’s your village that’s weird, ever think of that?” He says mid-yawn. The suggestion is proposed without any particular negative sentiment. Being ‘weird’ wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.

"I know we're weird. We are, uh, a dream." Vena frowns, trying to remember how the older Sisters who'd founded the enclave, Lashan and her contemporaries, put it. She is also trying not to yawn herself. "Where husbands and fathers, and... wives and mothers too I guess, and village elders, and the See church or whatever, and nobles don't just rule everything. And it doesn't matter if other people hate someone who's cursed, or a bayot, or, um, anything else as long as they get along and try to pull their weight somehow. But a lot of people like having money and more people around and sex not in the woods an', and stuff, so they leave and wake up 'ventually."

That seems to be about the shape of it. She frowns again and circles back. "So everyone's weird. You're boy-weird."

There are more people around now, and in daylight it's easier to tell that there's a higher than average number of women with disfiguring old injuries or dramatic birthmarks, or who're just visibly distinct in other ways. Guts is absolutely getting a lot of looks and some double takes.

It was a strange lot, that’s for sure. But during the day where it was easy to spot who exactly was staring at him, it wasn’t quite as unnerving as the figures peeking in the dark.

Although his early childhood was rather limited in what he gleamed of women in the merc camp, he wasn’t ignorant of how some would be abused. He’s been the recipient of the drunken spells of his own ‘Father’ after all. At the time, it just seemed like it was the natural way of things for him. If he’d worked harder, if he was stronger, he could appease that central force in his life and avoid it.

“Yeah. I get it. S’why I like being on my own instead on staying in town for too long. The animals don’t try to tell you what to do.”

His solution was to be isolated, but a woman with no swordsmanship to speak of wouldn’t really have the same option.

"And you can eat them if they try! So." Vena nods as if something has been decided and then she does yawn, much to her annoyance.

If she hadn't eaten so much last night she would've got something earlier in the morning. Usually when she gets an evening snack she shares more of it out! This is what happens when you babysit. She glances back and wonders if Guts will let her take his hand to lead him. It would, she knows, make people feel easier, there are a lot of them glancing at her before they decide how to react. But he doesn't like being touched hardly at all. It barely means anything for her to take someone by the hand but maybe mercenaries who don't really have friends think it's a bigger deal.

This late in the morning - she considers it late, anyway - there's a line composed of everyone who didn't get up at dawn and it will take a few minutes to work their way down it. A nervous, mousy sister finds some excuse to go further back in line rather than have Guts looming over her, leaving the parent from last night. They are still visibly tired and shifting uncomfortably while their baby dozes.

"Hi, uh-" Vena takes a second. Names! She knows everyone by sight but she's not friends with everyone. "Aren! I'm Vena. This is Guts. He's a guest."

"Everyone knows who you are, Vena," they murmur, chin tucked. Aren looks at him shyly through their eyelashes. They're tall and angular, in a dress with another of those plunging necklines. "Hello."

He assumes Aren must also be a woman, due to the baby sleeping soundly on them. Mothers were more often seen taking care of children in the kingdoms he wandered

Guts remembers their face, and the kind gesture that was most definitely not owed to him. Among all the staring faces, this one seemed okay to be next to for a while.

“…Hey.”

The sentence hangs awkwardly in the air. Guts feels unsure of how to make small talk, especially with a stranger. So he shuffles on his feet, attempts to make his face a bit less threatening, and avoids locking eye contact for too long.

He could easily match them for shyness, despite his intimidating stature. Vena will have to do some ice breaking if she wants him to say more.

Vena has noticed a friend running past pursued by a galloping puppy. She lurches in place, the whole top half of her body swaying as if to follow, her feet remembering to stay put, her face a mask of tragic resolve. She is being Responsible and not just having fun. It's a hard thing to do and her own nobility distracts her.

Aren decides the issue and tells the girl in their soft undertone, "I really need to get to the latrines. Since you chased my friend off, will you keep my place? And hold Kai."

"Huh? Yeah, okay," Vena says, not fully paying attention until the baby, wrapped up in gray-washed fabric, is imminent. She looks shocked for a second before accepting him with only modest awkwardness as Aren says "Make sure you support his head," and moves off with a nod to Guts.

Vena says, "Um," and joggles Kai against her shoulder, then gives Guts a long, speculative look. "Here, you want to hold him?"

Guts doesn’t say no, but he shoots a baffled look at Vena. He has never held a baby in his life, and it shows in the way he leans in to get a better look at Kai. What if he drops him? What if he grips too hard??

His questions go unanswered as his lack of protest results in baby in hand. The bundle is held with an incredibly cautious awkwardness, though he at least makes sure to cup the baby’s head in one of his hands.

“What’re we supposed to do if the kid starts cryin’?”

What if he poops and starts to reek? Guts feels totally out of place, thinking he might actually prefer wading through the ocean of frightened glances.

Mercifully for him, Kai appears to not be upset with them, instead staring with intense curiosity at the strange new person in view.

Edited 2022-06-30 03:34 (UTC)

Kai is large and very pudgy in all regards. While Vena has him mostly Guts can only see the back of his big head. The fist visible outside of his blanket is clenched tight and waving - being handed over has woken him up.

“Then he cries,” Vena says pragmatically. “I’ll take him back. I know what to do with babies, sort of.” Babies aren’t the most interesting thing to her, she’s just had to handle them now and then. She hikes Kai higher against her shoulder and makes an executive decision.

“Look, just hold your hands out for a minute. He’s too heavy for me.” She can totally carry heavier, Vena thinks. “I’d have to put him on the ground if you don’t and then he’ll crawl off.” And since Guts does not think to protest in time she deposits the whole infant into his arms.

Edited 2022-06-30 04:34 (UTC)

And so there we has, holding this pudgy baby, looking mildly perturbed that Kai found his face so unrelentingly fascinating. For his first up-close interaction, Guts wasn't doing poorly at all.

Eventually, he finds a comfortable place for the kid in the crook of his arm. He was big enough that he only really needed one to keep the bundle secure. Hopefully, a warm corner and a weird-looking boy person would be enough to occupy this baby for a bit.

"Sort of? Am I going to end up doing more of your chores?" he asks cheekily.

Edited 2022-06-30 06:58 (UTC)

“Lbh. Ih,” Kai says thickly, and similar things in that vein, staring with those bluish eyes pale babies so often have. He also flails his free arm and manages to smack Guts in the chest.

Vena risks a glance around. Just as planned. People like seeing Guts being semicompetent with a baby. It’s not enough to sway everyone but there are a lot more smiles and the speculative looks have a different cast. They’re also not worried-glancing at Vena as much, to either see if she’s safe or take their cue from how she’s acting. I am a genius, she thinks.

“Maybe! I don’t know yet!” While she’s shepherding him around she can’t do a lot of them, unless he’s watching or doing them too, after all. “Stick out your tongue at him. Or smile if that doesn’t hurt. Just make a face, anyway.”

"Uh. Ok."

The suggestion went against everything that was ironed into him since his own formative years. Although being around Vena made it easier to do so, playfulness wasn't a thing that came naturally to him. But looking at Kai, a truly tiny and helpless thing, makes him feel a little urge to at least try.

His smile is more of an awkward grimace, and he reaches in to wiggle a few fingers at Kai's flailing hand in a poor imitation of what he's seen before. Women liked to tickle their babies, right?? Kind of. The movement seemed to be briefly capturing the kid's attention. It was cute, the way he was being grasped at, but he feels his face get a little warm once he notices grins out of the corner of his eye.

Why does getting breakfast have to be such a mortifying ordeal? Guts felt like he was making a fool of himself.

"You're doing great," Vena says encouragingly. "Good thing this is a happy baby. I wouldn't've given you a fussy one, don't worry." No, she would have just suffered valiantly while getting punched in the chin. Vena prefers horses, honestly. Or swords. Swords are elegant as long as she's not supposed to be acting like she'll use them on someone.

And now Guts is the one getting fidgety. People are so hard to try and manage! Vena surreptitiously works her shoulder and sees Aren on their way back start to hesitate. She is the facilitator here, apparently!

"You can give him back to me now," she says nobly.

"I've got it."

He insists stubbornly back at her. He's not going to let some baby get the better of him! He can handle fighting men twice his size! He can wield a sword that can split open steel! Kai trying to stick his fingers in his mouth isn't nearly as mortal a challenge.

Even if it's a little awkward, he'll muscle through it. Metaphorically speaking.

Guts gingerly wipes his hand on his shirt, though. The spit was a little gross.

"Yeah but you gotta give 'im back to his-" Vena blanks out and can't remember the word, it's not ma or pa, so she says, "Aren's coming back."

"I don't know," Aren says, rewrapping the checkered shawl over their shoulders and glancing over Guts' shirt. "She looks pretty cute with him."

"No, he's a boy?" Sudden doubt, but then Vena remembers Lashan talking about Guts and puts more certainty into her voice. The panels of embroidery were removed from his hand-me-downs but they do still have a patterning and weave that suggest things to the Sisters of the Twins that outsiders wouldn't pick up on. "He's a boy, there were just only these and some heavy winter stuff that looked like they'd fit. Anyway, you can only win at babies by trying to make them happy, and then not having to deal with it when they start crying or make a mess," she says, and Aren stifles a laugh.

There’s a moment of confusion for him as well, as he’d never been mistaken for a ‘she’ ever in his life. Then again, when this village had women that looked like Lashan, he could kind of understand it a little more. But not by much, really. Being the outsider he was, from the upbringing and country he came from, this all made little sense to him.

“You sure your eyes are workin’ right?” he was feeling cheeky as he hands Kai over without a fuss, ”Maybe you ought to get the food first.”

He figures Aren must be a bit delirious from exhaustion and hunger. That must be the answer, clearly.

Aren flutters a bit over the handoff but accepts their baby in the spirit in which he's given, with a self-conscious smile. "Maybe. It looks like we're about up. Would... you two sit with me?"

It's loud in the dining hall, the sound of chatter trapped by the walls. Vena casts a look over her shoulder at Guts; she'll propose going outside if she has to. When she's not eating with her friends and there aren't too many flies, outside is better in her eyes anyway, but they need to actually pick up breakfast first.

Mostly people seat themselves at the long, low tables and take food from communal platters brought out by girls on kitchen duty. The waiting is mostly for space to be cleared, and messes to be handled if they're made. The table Aren goes to has milk-boiled grain porridge in tureens, whole peaches, day-old bread, soft white cheese, pickled eggs, and heaps of leafy greens cooked in butter. There are pitchers of warm milk, weak beer, and more of that watered vinegar. Also, some flowers.

"I miss salt," Aren says, looking up and down the table forlornly.

"We gotta buy it, or send people to the sea with pans, an' it takes a while to get there," says Vena, local exposition fairy, leaning half across the table to get a pot of jam. "The eggs are salty."

Aren sighs in a what-would-children-know way and adjusts Kai's sling. "It's not the same."

Their guest doesn't object, trailing along behind them and wordlessly picking what would satisfy his stomach. Once they get into the tables, he goes quiet.

He gets a good share of eggs as those were filling even on his most active days, nestled with a heap of greens. Bread was a given, having its place on the plate. He tilts his head at the milk, more accustomed to drinking beer than milk, but decides to switch up this time around. A peach ends up stowed away in his clothes, with the plate having a rather full mound with the portions of the other foods.

Unless Vena or Aren ask him something directly, he is content to be a silent bystander and listen to them banter. Once they find their spot outside, he occupies himself by picking at the food. His expression at mealtime is solemn - it is uncertain whether or not he's actually enjoying what he was eating - but the fact that he kept methodically cleaning the plate of its food was indicator of something. He liked it enough to finish, and he tolerated their company enough not to slip away to the infirmary.

The warm milk was comforting, and Guts pauses after each sip to enjoy the novel flavor. The ever-present suspicious look in his eyes soften. He seemed to be getting something out of the whole meal aside from fulfilling the simple requirement to eat and regain his strength. It was nice.

Edited 2022-07-03 02:08 (UTC)

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