|
"Ash Tree Cruel "Written By: Asymphototropic
Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam wing. Author: Asymphototropic (attracted toward the
light, but never quite arrives there) Rating: NC 17 Warnings: yaoi, violence, AU Summary: Duo is a wanderer, drawn to an ancient
barrow in the hopes of speaking to his master's death soul. Heero
is a guardian servant in this dangerous place. Will the death soul
seeker become a sacrifice on the bloody altar of a cruel cult? Pairings 1x2
"Ash Tree Cruel " Part 4: Dogwood True Heart His first impression was extreme relief. He found the boy alone, apparently unharmed by his wild flight. Leaning against a dogwood tree that reached its slender, bare branches beseechingly toward the chill winter firmament. His second impression was awe. The boy was gazing at a phenomenal view. Heero Yuy joined him in staring. The harsh, darkly framed forest ended. Beyond was an expanse of whispering, flat grassland. Which was interrupted in its muttered prayers, abruptly. There arose in that place a vast, ancient tumulus, perfectly circular in its boundary, perfectly symmetric in its dizzying rise. It was the largest grave mound Yuy had ever seen. "So many dead. What a great quantity of bones must be buried there." In a prominent place before it, an open circle, even more ominous seeming. A gathering of upright towering stones, overshading a grim, central altar. The barrow mound crouched at its feet, as if the abject graves were groveling there. "Think you they were battle-fallen? So many killed in one place to form so vast a barrow?" Yuy pondered the sight. Then glanced at his comrade. Duo's features had arrived at a ghostly pallor. The boy muttered silently. Chant, incantation? Supplication? A sudden shaking of the head. "A great multitude of voices. None his. Perhaps closer to the center." And the boy rushed out upon the grassy flat. One deep inhalation, and Yuy darted out after him. The boy was certainly fleet of foot. In fear of again losing him, Heero cast himself headlong, and grappled, tumbling them both roughly upon the ground. Duo whimpered. "Why doesn't he speak? Why is there no reply?" "Hush," Yuy hissed. Heart pounding fiercely, he lifted only onto his elbows, turning his head worriedly to scan all around them. They appeared to be alone. Alone with myriad death souls. Worm ridden corpses whom his comrade addressed. "It is time to leave this place," he stated firmly. Pulled the boy upright, and prodded him to running, clutching the smaller hand in an unbreakable clench, dragging him reluctantly. Back into the welcome camouflage gloom of the forest. The path was easy to find, reversing the trampled way where the Tanist and his followers had gone in the night, pursuing their gory rituals. Feeling the distance grow between themselves and the death convocation, Yuy finally allowed their pace to settle to a brisk stride. His panting calmed and he spoke. "Duo. If you were bent upon running. Couldn't you in the least run away from this gods-departed place?" He bit off the comment, feeling suddenly false in his righteous exasperation. This boy had every right to run where he would. Yuy was ignoring his plight, even promoting his doom, in the service of his commander's plans. He had known the boy a portion of one day and the subsequent night. And during that wretched measure of time, Heero had stood by, watching, while the Tanist had struck Duo down and beaten him. "No. I could not in the least run away. I came here on a purpose. And the Tanist said you would lie on the stone in my stead. How could I leave here, knowing that?" Duo asked simply. At this saying, Heero's irritation matured to anger. He stopped suddenly, grasped the boy by both shoulders. "You need to address your own welfare, for the nonce. Stop moaning about some dead oldster who has left you cast adrift." "Maybe I am honor bound to follow him," the boy suggested calmly enough. "And being the Solstice sacrifice is the intent of all the powers. So that I may be rejoined with my master." "You can't believe that," Heero snarled. "Why would the old man teach you so carefully, if he meant for you to die in your youth? Surely he was no fool?" He turned, dragging Duo again along the way, and stormed back toward the hut. "We have been without food too long. Our thinking is wanting in clarity therefore. I bid thee, no more thinking until after breaking fast." To his great surprise, he heard the boy respond with a chuckle.
"Start with some hot water, to warm the life into you," Yuy suggested. "I have some brew herbs, an you like it?" Duo offered, sorting through his portables. "Tea." The distant memory coaxed a smile from Heero. "I'm sorry. Not true tea. But some others that are stimulating and fragrant. If you would like to choose." Duo offered a selection of small bundles. He grasped the back of Heero's neck comfortably, as he held each packet under his comrade's nose. "This one." Yuy selected, smiled, a stray beam of sun from the sky circle highlighting the expression. They sipped the brew from a single small dish, each in turn. "It is pleasant. What is it, if no secret is revealed in the telling?" Yuy asked, stretching with the pleasurable stimulus. Duo sniffed at the decoction, as if deriving the recipe thereby. "Root of chicory. Nut of pinon. Berry of juniper. Sunrise sip of my mountain ancestors," he declared. Yuy marveled at the exotic air of his wanderer companion. "Ancestors," he murmured in response, nodding. "Heero Yuy. Traveler who remembers tea with distant fondness. Will you tell me of your first homeplace land? If it does not sadden you over much in the telling?" Heero's eyes lit, sun upon seawater. "I come from no land at all. Born, borne upon the Great Ocean. My people live in their vessels, upon the First Sea, where all life began. I am water born, and so my people name themselves. First cousins to the whales, my people are of this body." "Say more, if you will," Duo urged. "Ah, more. I had a hundred that eagerly named me not-kin. Any number of vessels that would claim me to a fine marriage. But I am warrior class. Too proud to join, see you? When I came of age. By right of high birth, I was cut with the conch shell and bled. Then fought the elders to prove my true nature. Hunted alone, bringing back my kill for the feast. Amongst my people, I am rather small, see you? And so, was all the more determined in the proof of my worthiness. I landed alone, built my own boat. Sturdy and true, very swift. Saying in my actions, 'any bride that wants me must come aboard if she dares'. " Heero's eyes glittered, his mouth twitched with humor. "At the time, I was very, very young, as you may perceive." "Oh, aye. Though now grown to vast old age," Duo grinned at his friend, who could not have been many years his elder. "See that you remember that, and speak with proper deference," Yuy chuckled, nudging the boy in the ribs with his elbow. "But to continue this tale a-proper. I sailed in my new boat amongst the fleet of my people. But alone in my craft. As was bound to happen, sooner or later, there came a great typhoon. A life threatening catastrophe. I was driven far adrift, my masts and sails all lost in the storm. I would then have died, far from land, far from sweet water, battered by the elements, my people far a-gone. But I was overtaken by pirates. A great crowd of ugly, misfit vessels. They handed my sleek craft to one of their own leaders. And tossed in my person, as part of the tribute. Their custom was generally to torture, then kill their captives. They were very low, generally feckless folk. Who lived upon angry pillage and depraved plunder." "And what saved you, pray?" Duo asked eagerly. "My eyes that are seawater blue." "An element of superstition?" "Not so. An element of mere avarice. Sometimes in a while, these pirates would find themselves upon the same part of the sea as the great dragon ships of the north. Those grand golden sailors, traveling far and wide most fearlessly. The pirate captain claimed I must actually be of the Norse lineage. As judged by my blue eyes. He therefore had hopes that the Norse chieftains would ransom me, as one of their own. And if not, I could always be killed at the time of their disappointed ambitions." Duo shuddered on behalf of his comrade. "Were you harshly used?" "Yes. But at least my captivity was not too long in the hands of those brutes. For which I give thanks. And I am of a hopeful nature, having been trained to endurance from my earliest days. So I maintained my strength, and looked always forward. Until the time that the pirates and the Norse ships encountered at last. This was when I first laid sight upon my Liege Lord Merquise." Duo blinked. This master clearly was not the Tanist of Su. He held his breath silently, urging onwards the story. "He was as noble and brilliant as the pirates were smudge-ugly. When he saw me, heard the ransom proposed. He looked me up and down and up again. 'Boy, art of my people?' he asked straight out and away. The pirate captain had trained me in the Norse language, to improve the illusion of my ancestry, so that I understood the question and could reply. But let me just say. My Lord Merquise is very haughty, and holds himself upright most nobly. And he is very tall. Towering. As am I not." Yuy paused upon a wry chuckle. "It brought out all the worst of my pride, I may tell you. So that I looked the man directly in his eyes. And then I straightened as tall as I could. That is, not very. And I answered, 'not to my knowledge'." Duo groaned. "As well you may complain. Here had I been hoping daily and nightly for the chance of ransom to the Norsemen. And all I could do upon the actual event was to grow all pride full and offend my potential rescuer. My Lord rubbed his chin in his hand. Looked me over again from top to toes, with the laugh growing upon his lips. 'Perhaps our distant ancestors met?' he suggested with much amusement. 'Perhaps,' I responded most grudgingly. And then for good measure, added, 'Our very distant ancestors. Perhaps'. Then said my Lord Merquise. 'You must have acquired your outrageous hauteur from someplace, certainly.' At which saying, he laughed out loud. His patent amusement made me doubly enraged. My face glowed hot and red, and I turned scornfully away. This brought the pirate captain's temper to a boil. He decked me with a single blow and commenced kicking the life out of me. 'Nay,' my Lord Merquise called out languidly. 'I'll not ransom my kinsman, an you damage him.' At which the two struck up a barter exchange. And so I was sold from the pirates into the hands of the Norse sailors. For some cloth of wool. An old rusty cutlass. And some amber beads. That were curiously crawly with trapped inward insects. All of which I take to be my true worth upon the earth. And remind myself thereof whenever I am too inclined to hauteur." So completing his tale, Heero Yuy laughed also. Then he opened the sack of provisions, recently acquired from his chieftain, and spread the delights before his companion. "A fair spread," he declared. "Here are potatoes and eggs, roasted slowly over coals. A fresh loaf of bread that smells excellently well. A lovely round of the whitest cheese. And dried apples. Oh, and best of all. These little delicacies are sweet cakes. What will you try first?" Duo took up one of the small cakes, and nibbled at it. Heero launched into the provisions with a fine will. When he had settled first cravings, he looked again at his comrade. The cake remained in the boy's hand, and the hand in the boy's lap. "Is it not to your liking?" "It is fine. But lately, though my stomach still asks for victuals, my throat shrinks dryly, refusing them." Heero Yuy, young though he was, recognized the image of mourning when he saw it. He spoke now, softly. "Duo. A little more about my people. Not the Norsemen, for they all seem bent upon dying in battle. But speaking of my own true people. Those born, borne upon the ocean. It was deemed the greatest blessing of the gods. First to spend a long life in a worthy calling. Next to lie down to sleep, hearkening to the vast murmur of the sea. Last, to die peacefully in sleep. To merge softly the rest of the living with that of death." Duo nodded silently. "Wasn't your master a very great teacher? Very wise and full of knowledge?" "Oh, indeed was he that," the boy fervently replied. "I tell you truly. I think it was his life's calling. His true quest. The reason for his restless journeying. The seeking and then the giving of knowledge. Duo. I truly believe what I say now. It was you, and you alone for which your master lived. You were his quest. You." The boy commenced trembling. "Was not your master old?" Duo nodded thoughtfully. "He claimed he stopped counting upon an hundred winters." Yuy's eyes widened. "Boon of the Gods," he commented. "And died he peacefully in his sleep?" The boy again nodded. "Duo. You told me before. The dead speak chiefly of their deaths. And of yearnings unfulfilled. I know not of these things. The death souls speak not to me, for which I am thankful. But consider this possible? Your master lived fulfilled, teaching a most eager and apt pupil. And died peacefully. Therefore speaks his death soul not. Because it is at rest." The boy gulped hard around a lump in his throat. His voice quavered small. "I have been foolish. Naming mine an urgent quest. A seeking of knowledge. When merely was it my childish loneliness for my master's company, all along. And even more have I been selfish. Teasing at his peaceful death soul. Wishing it were less quiet for my own wrong minded motives. I thank you, friend, for pointing me toward this view of my flaws." "Duo. No. I meant the saying as comfort. Not condemnation," Heero stated earnestly. But his voice caught on his emotion, and it sounded harshly upon his ears. The boy folded his arms across his chest, and shuddered on an inward pain. Heero Yuy upon a sudden, wishing fervently to halt the progression of this scene, grasped the boy solidly in his arms, clasping him firmly. He leaned his cheek against the other's soft skin. Then pressed his mouth full upon the boy's lips. ~ * ~ tbc....
|
