triangularity | Hadand | runaway AU where her betrothal is dissolved

She remained silent as he glared down at her with those angry green eyes she’d braced herself all her life to endure. To deflect. He had never struck her, but he’d beaten Evred and Barend frequently enough that his presence in the schoolroom had felt akin to impending thunder all the days of their childhood.

“I will marry Joret, and you’ll get an honorable treaty,” he said, having planned that much, and practiced it over and over to get it out in one piece, with no tremor.

She gasped. "What?”

“Marry. Joret. You and I. Go to Father together. You marry a p-p-prince. Trade. Alliance. All with honor.” He got that out with utter conviction—there was no going back, not now. He’d promised Joret.

"Have you, uh, seen her?” Hadand groped wildly for the real world, which seemed to have slipped sideways, leaving her in a terrible dream.

--

The week or two that follow are like a bad dream continued. None of it is real, somehow, until she sees Joret at Aldren's side in front of the whole city. Joret is as unwilling to take Hadand's place as hlinlaef, the heir's betrothed, as Hadand was to give it up. It was her duty. And her home, of course. And her honor, she supposes. She was going to outrank every woman in the kingdom, and she's trained all her life for it. If Hadand has to leave her responsibilities to anyone else, someone she loves and trusts like a sister is obviously best, but...

But trouble seeks out Joret, lured in by her beauty. Hadand thinks she'd be hard-put to find a single man in the kingdom, at least among those whose interests run toward women, who isn't attracted to Joret.

None of that is left to her, and she's seen what Queen Wisthia's life was like every day for the past twenty years. No Marlovan, Hadand included, ever gave the queen much in the way of respect or consideration. They conducted the business of the kingdom around her, as if she were furniture. Hadand can't bring herself to be put in that situation. Deposited in another kingdom whose customs she doesn't understand, ruler in name but never in fact, always an outsider.

Hadand knows she won't refuse, if the king asks it of her. She doesn't think he'd ever order it, but he'll ask, along with other options that won't benefit the kingdom nearly as much. Staying in Iasca Leror won't be included in her list of options. Hadand left here would be a rallying point for strife and bickering among all the Jarls, a carefully planned royal betrothal made decades ago set aside in favor of the heir's obsession with a pretty face. Her sense of duty is too strong to say no, so she has to be out of the palace before the question is posed.

She loves the palace and Choread Hesea, raised in the royal nursery after being fostered into her betrothed's family at age two. It was never just duty. Aldren has taken her home from her along with the position she's worked for all her life. He won't take the rest of her choices from her.

Hadand writes a letter to her mother first of all, in code and handed to Tesar for personal delivery. She packs very little, hides as many weapons on her person as she can manage, and, in equal measures desperation and cold deliberation, seizes the first opportunity for escape she comes across.

Her younger brother was smuggled out of the kingdom on a ship over six years ago, and it seems to be Hadand's turn for the same. She lets a wave of guilt and regret at the thought of her mother, now childless, wash over her. Then she sets it aside for another day. Right now, she has to figure out what comes next.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Are other... what do your people call themselves?" But she'll continue her question and let him answer both at once once she's done. "Do you tend to be a solitary and quiet people, or is yours a social culture?"

Everything is foreign to her, and Hadand is struggling not to admit to herself how daunting it is to leave Iasca Leror. She wasn't supposed to. Queens stay home. Marlovans are insular. Even her Sartoran speech, which is understood by most of the world, is quaint and out of date by standards elsewhere, a couple generations old. She's still not quite sure who she is without her own culture and traditions.

Arthur gazed curiously down toward her at her inquiry, he didn't seem to mind though. Giving a sweet smile, "We're giants, cloud giants specifically. My family is related to the Nephilim kind which are a group of giants with healing powers, but there's a lot of training of the heart and mind to achieve that..."

For a while since Arthur was young he was trained to focus on healing others, particularly with dreams and small wounds through music. It's all he knew before they passed on, he sadly doesn't know much else other than that. "And we're the first sort, a lot of the cloud giants don't want to be part of any affairs we'd rather heal who needs us and move on with our own lives. I think my parents would only go down if others requested help and bargain if need be, I know they were more social than some of the others."

Hadand sounds eager and interested. "You live in the clouds and have healing powers? Have you had any of the training? My people don't have access to any magical knowledge, though of course we have the same magic every human does." They just can't do anything with it.

"And I can't imagine living alone. I grew up in a palace, in the middle of a city, and there were always other people around. I have to find somewhere to go next."

Arthur gave a little bit of a frown, from what he did know was very basic as he was so young when he was taught some of healing methods. "O-Oh I, I know a little bit, I know how to heal nightmares away for sure. But physical ailments still need work, I-I haven't been trained enough to know how to full heal wounds yet on my own."

At the very least Arthur knew healing with certain items and spells but he's not very confident in it. But it was his own problems of self-doubt that was setting him back unfortunately. With no one there to guide him it was hard to be confident in his abilities just yet. Giving a breath, "I-I don't know if I'll be ever as good as my parents... They passed on sadly before they could teach me any more of that..."

Arthur gave a weak smile at that, "Our race is almost gone, I don't think I've seen another like me in a long time. I've also never been around that many humans myself, but I worry on how other perceive me considering..."

Hadand tilted her head, fascinated. "I don't think any human healers work with dreams. You can soothe away the bad ones?"

But her face tightened with sympathy, though Arthur couldn't see it, when he continued. "I've lost my people too now, but not through death. Were you and your parents very close? I love my mother, and my aunt, but my father was distant."

She wasn't shocked to hear that cloud giants are almost gone, in spite of talking to one. "Most races other than humans are gone. It's why I was so surprised to see you."

Arthur held his hands quietly, rubbing his thumb against his palm to try and keep himself from getting nervous talking about his talents. Nodding as he took a little breath, "Yeah, when someone is having a nightmare I recite a spell to make it disappear into the night. And then I give them a whole new dream, a good dream. They come like little orbs into my garden in my castle and I collect them like butterflies, my family specialized in them for a long time."

Looking down, oh but there wasn't a day that had gone by where Arthur's heart still ached from witnessing his parents death. "Y-Yeah... I... I miss them every day... I-I wish I was able to save them when they..."

Growing quiet, Arthur shivered, trying to fight the tears that stung his eyes at the mere memory of the event.

Edited 2016-10-07 05:51 (UTC)

The talk of dreams and magic was incredibly interesting, and Hadand itched to ask more, after all her years of thwarted study. She laid that aside for now, though. Some things mattered more.

"I'm sorry for your loss." Hadand said quietly. "I haven't seen my mother in seven years, and my brother in longer than that. My aunt, who raised me, was killed this year, along with several others in my family."

She hesitated before adding, "I put the kingdom first. I held it together, but I couldn't save anyone else."

It might be a mistake, revealing that much about herself, but at least it was to someone who clearly rarely interacted with humans.

Arthur rubbed his eyes as he sniffed quietly. Trying to regain his composure for her. For being a giant his heart had such a soft touch. Gazing over to her, "T-To have all that happened... You're so strong to still be brave after that, I-I'm trying my hardest to be that but I still..."

Gives a weak smile, "I guess it's different, I'm not really anyone important after all, just a giant..."

"You didn't spend your whole life told you had to be strong, with no choice in the matter. You're hurting for good reason." Her voice was calm but understanding. Subtle sympathy and no pity attached to it.

"I'm no one important anymore either," Hadand said, with the vague sinking sense of guilt at leaving. "I left, and I'm not going back."

Hadand | runaway AU where her betrothal is dissolved | Open to assorted cross-canon AUs!

Feel free to ignore this if you don't feel like picking it back up.

Is fine <3

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject