nun-of-yabiz

[nun-of-yabiz]

Ezran Galtier-Zynthe hates First Fridays. On the first Friday of every month, all the people of Eluyvin gathered in the plaza to inform and discuss the town happenings. She hated them.

Hated having to leave her cabin on the edge of the woods. Hated having to leave her hound, Buster, alone in the rundown kitchen. She'd have to leave her few precious books; the old leathery covers and musty pages made her feel warm and fuzzy inside. Maybe it was the dust, but she didn't care.

Ezran's thoughts were interrupted when Vincent blabbered on and on about the latest 'Fae gossip'.

"I've heard there was another attack on the Tiernathian border a few days ago." Vincent garbled out more random tidbits of gossip as the duo walked.

Tiernath.

Where Faeries' ruled without consequence. Ezran had seen pixies in the depths of the woods behind her cabin, but had never seen a Faerie person before.

"Ezran...Ezra-hey, are you even in that big-ass head of yours?" Vincent jabbed the girl's shoulder, and she jolted out of her thoughts.

"What the hell, Vince?" Ezran snapped at the scrawny male. They'd been friends since childhood; the male having been bullied and picked on by other kids, and the female beating the shit out of them.

Vincent Clemont had sandy brown hair, and eyes so dark they appeared to be black. Wearing his favorite green tunic and dark gray doublet, he looked less like a thin teenager, and closer to his own twenty-six years.

"You seem to be in la-la-land." He chided.

Ezran continued ran her fingers through the frayed ends of her brown braid. "So what if I am?" She grouched. Vincent gasped in mock-offense. "I am giving you the gift of gossip, and you aren't even listening!"

"I'm just feeling pissy that I'm being forced to leave the comfort of my own home to go to a damned 'meeting', where the same information is spouted every single time." She rolled her eyes, braid falling back over her shoulder.

Ezran ducked under a low-hanging branch of a pine tree, leaving it to hit Vincent smack-dab in the middle of his pale face. Ezran snorted with laughter when she heard the satisfying whack.

"Asshole." The short male groaned, as they took a turn on the dirt path, the edge of the town in sight. "Anyway, 'allegedly', the King of Tiernath is finally picking some poor girl to marry the Crown Prince."

Ezran's face paled. "You have to be kidding me. Please tell me you are joking."

To keep the humans on the continent satisfied, every eligible female was put into a drawing pool, the the selected female became the Fae nobility's bride. It kept the human's content; it gave them the small comfort of the power they didn't have.

"Aren't I lucky to be a man." Vincent gave Ezran a weak smile. Amber eyes met near-black ones. "Ezra.." he sighed. "It's today."

Her eyes nearly bulged from her head. Then the duo burst into laughter.

"I feel terrible for that poor soul." Vincent gasped for air as he trembled with laughter. "As do I." His friend wiped laughter-induced tears from her eyes.

Ezran sighed and undid her braid, letting lengthy brown tresses fall down her back. "You need a haircut." Vincent noted.

"I'll get a haircut when you decide to as your 'little friend' out on a date." Ezran shot back as the market stalls into view. Vincent Clemont's cheeks flushed red, and he shut his gaping mouth.

The marketplace bordering the town of Eluyvin blossomed with color. Vibrant fuchsia colored the cotton roofing of booths, wagons of every type of wood, from oak to cherry tree wood, littered empty corners, and products galore were displayed. Ezran could smell the bakery's fresh lemon pastries from here; her favorite.

After some insistent pleading, the nineteen year old got Vincent to stand in line with her for a pastry.  The warm smell of the Clover & Honey Bakery lulled them into comfort as they waited to order a sweet treat.

"What were you saying about the Tiernathian border attack?" Ezran spoke, feeling as though she'd been silent for too long.

"Oh, right. Supposedly the Daemonikai completely wrecked one of the border walls nearly a week ago."

The Daemonikai . Demons. Ever since they appeared, the Hell demons drained the soul of anything they touched, but they craved for magic. Daemonikai have preyed on the Faerie and their creatures for centuries, but the wretched beasts weren't deterred from having an easy human snack.

"I've heard the King increased the amount of patrols surrounding the kingdom borders." Vincent continues.

Her friend wasn't wrong. Ezran had noticed more soldiers surrounding town when she would stop by the Fallons' to sell animal pelts.

When they got to the front of the line, Ezran purchased a lemon pastry, and bought Vincent a blueberry tart, which he greedily devoured with a grin. "Food certainly tastes better when someone else pays for it." He smirked. Ezran jabbed her elbow into his ribcage, eliciting a yelp from the male as she slid four coppers towards the cashier behind the counter.

The two gathered on the edges of the stone plaza, hewn granite cracked and worn down beneath their boots. Ezran went back to fidgeting with the ends of her hair, and Vince fussed over the state of her navy blue shirt collar.

"Goodness, I need to teach you how to stitch seams better. This was a gaudy job-I could see this blocks away..." he fussed over her shirt and jacket as she got lost in her thoughts.

Her father had been a stone worker. Darius Galtier had helped cut the stone that was the foundation beneath his very feet. Even after surviving the pain of Ezran's mother's death, the man had found happiness with his daughter and second wife.

Until he died in a mine accident three years before. Her stepmother, Lillith, passed soon after from the heartbreak.

Ezran scanned the ground that was visible, bodies not over it. She squinted to see if her father's name was carved into the floor, along with so many others. She quelled the pain and the grief, looking back up at Vincent and swatting his nimble hands away.

"You mother hen.." Ezran grumbled. However, she couldn't help but feel grateful for having such an attentive friend. Minutes later, the tittering and gossiping in the square was hushed away, and Ezran stood on her tippy toes, just in time to see the elected mayor step up onto the dais. The male coughed, preparing to speak.

The male (Ezran neither cared nor liked him enough to know his name) stoically announced the coming years' spending budget (very little), the most popular restaurant in town (Clover & Honey Bakery, of course), and his impending retirement (thank heavens).

"And lastly.." Ezran peeked up as the man spoke; this was different. Normally the mayor's impromptu speech would have been over.

"...Addressing the rumors of the Crown Prince's marriage.."

Vincent pinched Ezran's arm, shifting from her right to her left so he could see better.

"..it is true. As of today, April 6, 478 N. E, every female in attendance will take a slip of paper," he gestures to the small brown paper slips to his left, "write her name-first and last, and drop it in the ball." He gestured to the ball-shaped basked to his right.

"No one is allowed to leave until every female here has done so." It seemed even the birds went silent. And then, the sounds of clanging iron and rustling chain mail echoed through the town square.

"Holy shit." Ezran mouthed to Vincent, seeing the Tiernathian soldiers appear and block all the exits. "They were serious."

"It appears so." Vincent muttered under his breath.

Moments later, chaos ensued. Every unmarried female over the age of seventeen rushed to those damned paper slips, scrawling out their names in various forms of handwriting.

Ezran backed up towards the northwest corner of the square as females clambered to the East wall where the sphere container was.

"I...I'll put my name in..." Ezran paused when she saw a blonde woman trip over a redhead, both ladies toppling to the floor.

"...when I see people are no longer tripping over their own feet." She finished.

"That is likely the best idea I have heard this week." Vincent chuckled back.

After nearly twenty minutes of ruckus later, the majority of females had put their names into the container. Apparently, the mayor had been keeping track of who hadn't put their name into the repository, and listed them aptly.

"Maralyth Ezrel...Ryn Westly...Ezran Galtier-Zynthe..."

The mayor listed nearly ten more people after her. "Go!" Vincent nudged Ezran towards the dais where she would have to write her name. "You can do it Ez'!"

"I don't need a pep talk to write my damn name." She grumbled, but stalked up towards the dais.

A navy doublet sliced through prairie dresses of plum, peach, and butter yellow, and the sound of worn sole echoed on the stone floor. Ezran sighed, pausing in front of the little table to her right, and gasped a small piece of brown parchment.

She hastily scrawled down 'Ezran Galtier-Zynthe', and glared at the mayor as she turned to her left, approaching the table holding the spherical container. She could see piles and piles of parchment scraps inside.

Ezran scribbled a frowning face by her last name before folding the paper in half, and dropping it into the container's opening. She turned around, and slinked across the plaza back towards Vincent.

The frown on her face was nearly identical to the frown she drew on her paper slip, and it deepened when she couldn't find him. After searching around the plaza, she finally found Vincent talking to old friends by the South wall.

"Someone tried to sneak away from me.." she grouched, and grunted when he pulled on her ear.

"You were taking too damn long." He laughed. His eyes seemed to shift in the late afternoon light.

"I didn't even take that long." She huffed, and rolled her eyes as he adjusted the white streaks of her hair to be more viewable.

"Hey-" She snapped, but he cut her off. "-it's pretty. Enjoy it, Ezra. Not everyone is as unique as you."

"That sounds insulting." She muttered, but shut up when the mayor approached the dais from her right.

The plaza was so silent that every step the old man took reverberated through the open space. Every creak of mottled wood was longer than the last as he climbed the wooden steps. Ezran could hear coughing and hushed whispers echo throughout the large crowd.

The mayor finally reached the middle of the platform, and a pale, dark haired lackey hurried up the steps with the spherical repository. Everyone within the crowd was so quiet that the rustling paper slips could be heard from inside the container.

The mayor cleared his throat as an elderly woman, whose hair was more gray than brown, and had stumps for legs, stuck her pudgy fingers into the bin and began to mix up the names.

"After my darling Dorothy pulls out a name, the selected will come up to the dais immediately." The mayor's voice bumbled along as he blabbered about 'standard protocol.'

Ezran rolled her eyes, and leaned back against the cool stone wall. Vincent glanced at Ezran to his left, and the look on her face was begging if she could go home immediately after. Vincent gave her a knowing smirk in response.

When the mayor stepped back, rifling through the little paper slips, the crowd exploded with more flavorless chatter. When the mayor stepped forward again, the chatter stopped.

"Would the following female report to the dais immediately." The mayor's voice echoed through the silent town square; Ezran was beyond convinced he was drawing this out for dramatic effect.

She returned to fidgeting with her cufflinks; twin silver dragons on the cuffs of her doublet when the mayor spoke again.

"The female who is to be the bride of the Crown Prince of Tiernath is..."

Ezran exhaled in exasperation.

"Ezran Galtier-Zynthe."

#fantasy #original story #mystery #romance #part one