Lyiss is only Lyiss
Lyiss tentatively gazed over at the men who were standing chatting together and warming their hands before the blazing midsummer fire. She felt awkward and self-conscious and was beginning to wish she had not come. If it had not been for Nyawe she probably wouldn’t have.
She was what they called one of they unlucky few. The girls and women who had not had a husband when they came to Mhalwae. The men where scarce and there was not much chance of making a good marriage. There was barely any choice as it was. And for woman of her status there was not one man. She would marry beneath her if she were lucky enough to marry at all. And she was sure she wasn’t, she was only plain Lyiss. Who would want her compared to the other girls? She gazed over at them giggling together and felt even more sure. Soon she would be the only “unlucky one”.
Her brother turned to her and murmured gently, “Are you really sure you want to go along?”
She appreciated his concern but she had already agreed to go along with the other girls and it would have humiliated her even more to back out at this point.
“No… it’s fine I…”, she began softly.
“Of course she wants to come along silly… don’t you Lyiss dear?”, Nyawe was suddenly beside her crowing.
“It is ever so much fun and who knows who she may dream of. To be sure I never dreamed it would be you Garald”, she chuckled throatily.
Lyiss shrank beside her, feeling more plain than ever, her dusky freckled skin fading away next to the pale glory that was handsome Nyawe.
“So perhaps we might not be putting so much faith in it after all”, she mused, “but it is a good laugh anyway”.
“Alright then Lyiss… if it’s what you want…”, Garald muttered but was interrupted by the sudden appearance of Kelgar.
“Ladies, ladies, ladies”, he cried with a flourish.
“It is I who is to be your guide and guard on this dangerous journey of yours tonight. But never fear, I will lead you valiantly to success in your mission and who’s to say by the end of the night perhaps one of you lucky ladies will be a husband richer”, he jeered with a wink.
Lyiss flushed, unable to forget that Kelgar was one of the only unmarried men on the island.
The other girls had begun to giggle helplessly.
“Yer to be our guard good sir… but yer one of them very husbands we may be dreamin’ of tonight if yer bein’ that lucky”, Maire cried boldy while Igrayne snickered beside her.
“Oh I’m not bein’ the only potential man out there for you lovely young ladies. Why just over there by the fire stands our friend Arran Barran and what a fine young man he is isn’t he girls?”
He pointed in the direction of the fire as Arran began to shift nervously from foot to foot, aware that they were discussing him.
“So I think I have a bit of competition eh?”, he wiggled his eyebrows suggestively at them.
Lyiss began to feel sick and faint, the blush in her cheeks spreading helplessly over her neck and breast. Oh why had she agreed to this. She should never have come.
“If yer could excuse me fer bein’ so daft good sir but if yer to be bein’ our guide tonight then whose to be protectin’ our maidenhood from the likes of potential husbands such as yerself”, Maire cried in mock outrage while Igrayne tried not to giggle beside her.
“That’s where I fit in my dear ladies”, Nyawe chuckled stepping up beside Kelgar, “I will be your chaperone tonight”.
“So you see my lovelies… tonight you’ll be well protected”, Kelgar chuckled, “both from the dreadful beasties that be creeping outside the castle walls and the other beasty that be hiding in a much closer location”.
“A closer location hmmm…”, Igrayne mused, “perhaps we should be playin’ hide and seek and findin’ out that location. I think I be havin’ a fair idea where that beasty is a’ hidin’ I do”.
Lyiss was shocked by their brazen words. They were hinting at things she could only vaguely grasp at, things that were not to be spoken of. She was ashamed to be part of such conversation with her brother standing right beside her. She could feel his body growing rigid beside her as he flinched with embarrassment at his wife’s behaviour.
“Come now ladies… enough of this mindless chatter. Save the hide and seek for later when your in possession of a wedding ring. I believe it is time that you stopped speaking altogether. It begins now. I don’t want to hear a peep out of you or you’ll have to begin all over again”, Nyawe commanded with a hearty laugh.
Maire and Igrayne looked at each other in despair. Lyiss too was wondering how they could manage to stay quiet for the entire time. It would be a much less difficult feat to find seven different flowers than for them to hold their tongues for even an hour.
Lyiss felt her brother’s worried eyes gazing at her. She tried to smile to reassure him but found it all but impossible.
He opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted by Nyawe.
“Come along now sister dear… it’s a husband we’ll be finding for you tonight”, she grabbed Lyiss firmly around the waist herding her in the direction of the other girls.
“Oh but wait… I must be getting a kiss from my own husband first since I’m lucky enough to have one!”
She thrust herself forward, all hips and breasts and lips. Lyiss watched as her brother arched his body away from his wife’s and turned his face so that she collided with his cheek instead of where she had been aiming.
“Alright ladies, that’s done. Let’s be going then”, she said loudly and turned on her heel leading them away from the fire to hide her blushing face.
For a brief moment Lyiss actually felt pity for her sister-in-law. But it quickly faded as she trotted awkwardly behind.
Hi guys… sorry to be introducing such a large amount of new characters in this post. I think it is the first time I have done one from the perspective of a non-original Mhalwae character. But I love Lyiss (I wasn’t planning her at all… when I made Garald I rolled to see what a baby girl from his parents would look like and got her and so I had to have her in the story) and I wanted to do something a bit fun for Midsummer. The next chapter is going to be from Kelgar’s POV so I am heading into new territory here… I was planning to only let characters have a POV once they had been in the story for a while (I mean we haven’t ever got to peek into Arran’s head yet but I want to do one soon so hopefully).
So I hope you are happy about the character addition and not sad that I am not focusing more on the ones I already had. I will try and focus on everyone!
And sorry for the complete over-use of my castle setting… but it is like the only thing I have apart from the the two peasant cottages (almost three when Hepsie, Steen and Thaell move out to theirs). Oh… and the ship which I am thoroughly sick of.
Oh right… I forgot the ruined church and the being-built church. But apart from that (my argument doesn’t seem so good now actually
)
Heehee seven flowers gathered in silence, I happen to know it can lead to romantic evenings.
I think I read that it was some kind of Scandinavian tradition actually, maybe you know.
How long has it been since the last attack? Is it just me or are these kids crazy for going outside of the castle at twilight?
Not that kids have ever been clever when it comes to such things.
Lyiss and Arran Barran would so obviously be so cute together! Both shy like that. Of course he may still be grieving…
I don’t know, I still don’t feel too sorry for Nyawe. Even though her husband is so obviously gay *or* so obviously totally in love with another woman. I would hate to be Lyiss though, stuck between those two.
And don’t be shy about showing your castle courtyard, which I still love, and don’t worry about showing inside the heads of new and random characters, either. I think it’s more fun… the story is still being told, right? The more POVs the more chances you have of seeing something in a unique way. But I would *love* to get a chapter from Arran Barran’s POV. He’s so pitifully adorable.
Don’t apologize for the set–I love it! A lot of these medieval stories take place inside so much that it’s nice to get a gander outside the castle walls.
It’s a really good setup, too, so I don’t mind looking at it at all.
I was a little overwhelmed by all the new names/faces, but I’m one of those few who doesn’t transition well. I do like Lyiss, though, and Kelgar makes me laugh! If anything, I hope to see more of them. I also want to know why Garald shrunk away from his ever-so-amorous wife. Did I miss something? Probably. It was an interesting exchange, nonetheless.
I feel so bad for Lyiss… she seems so timid and all those men seem so… well, not timid.
The last attack was over a month ago. As Lochan mentions in Lochan decides they wanted to set a trap for Cebrien but so far it hasn’t worked and they are not sure why. So far they have just had a guy hanging out waiting for him to show up and he hasn’t. But then they haven’t been trying every night. They have been reluctant as yet to use a female for bait but that is going to change now because they are getting kind of desperate.
The reason Kelgar is going with them really is to protect them lest anything happen… so the part about guarding was actually true. Because they still think it is just some psychopath on the loose so they think Kelgar could take him on. And they aren’t too worried since it is such a big group. The other thing is that they are really not going far from the castle. The girls are hoping they can find the flowers quite near by as they aren’t allowed to go very far into the forest.
Nyawe… I don’t know… I don’t even know how I feel about her. Remember hear we were seeing her from Lyiss’ perspective. But things are definitely weird between Nyawe and Garald and we will eventually find out why (I just have heaps I want to do before then
. And I will get around to poor Arran Barran very soon… I have an idea!
You didn’t really miss anything Mao except hints that we got from Nyawe in Nyawe finds a worthy opponent that her husband wasn’t interested in her and also from Garald in Lochan decides when Eallair suggests he should go to bed with his lovely wife and he declines. So something is a bit up there.
Lyiss is beautiful, I can’t wait to see more of her. This will be a very interesting midsummer’s eve.
Sorry Lothere… I forgot to answer your question about the flower-gathering. Yes… I believe it actually is a Swedish tradition. I am too superstitious to do it though because I would be upset if I didn’t dream about my boyf
I did the flower-weaving last midsummer and made a somewhat lopsided and fally-aparty head dress and we danced like idiots around the maypole.
I have to say I couldn’t quite get over my morbid fear of ticks to enjoy the flower gathering for the weaving though. I know it is weird… but they have this tick-borne encephalitis here which is really prevalent particularly in the Stockholm archipelago (where we spent midsummers) and I can’t help but check every two seconds if I have a tick. People keep telling me that it is super-strange to be so worried about ticks when I come from a place like Australia where pretty much everything can kill you
. But for some reason it is way less scary when it is your own things. I know how to deal with snakes and spiders (I really hate spiders though *shudder* and crocodiles but I would completely lose it if I came up against a bear or something. Or a tick apparently 
I like seeing new characters. It helps keep the story fresh.
I was wondering as I read what sort of crazy encephalitis this is that it would terrify someone from Australia… where anything with less than one or more than four legs has deadly venom and can kill you. But I guess I get the strangeness factor playing in there. My husband is all scared of bears too. And rabies! They don’t have rabies in France. So here in Canada OMG everything might have rabies!!! The rabid skunks and raccoons! Oh, and the rattlesnakes and mountain lions! And moose! (which actually are the deadliest land animals, I think I read once…) Or rabid moose! Whatever.
But I am sure I would jump 10 feet straight up into a tree if I ever saw a real live scorpion.
Rabies! Eeek…. we don’t have that in Australia either and whenever I see a squirrel I am like “bet that one’s rabid… looks cute but it’s probably rabid… no stay away… don’t come near me you… I don’t have any acorns!”. My co-supervisor got bitten by a rabid guinea-pig when he was a kid and had to have 12 injections into the lining of his stomach. Urk! But seriously… a rabid guinea-pig… hehe. See even small cute things can be deadly where you live!