1st Draft Fridays - A Fistful of ... (#6)

Breidentel

Geddis rubs her eyes, wishing Dakadza were here. He'd helped his sister rule his clan, back in Marsdenfel, and he'd helped the elves rebuild from what had been destroyed in their capture years ago and the neglect they'd had to fix when they finally returned home.

He'd have ideas for what to do about this.

Her shoulders burn, but she keeps the line, hauling one more refugee past her to the next person in the chain helping refugees make it up the road winding up to Breidentel's gate.

She's too big to be more than a hindrance further down the inconsistent and often narrow path, making her glad she'd come here via portal. (Also a bit nervous about how she'll leave, when the time comes, but...she can deal with it then.)

She's strong, though, and that suits her place near the top, one of the last links before the gate. Her position means she can see past the chain, to where people struggle with the dangerous trek alone.

(Hadn't Breidentel been the top realm for the elves around here, before Marsdenfel was created? Why had they made their entrance like this?)

Sometimes a person slips, making her nervous. The path has cliffs and drops—

As if her thought caused it, a scream and a wail break the air as someone slips, too far down the path to be assisted. Their belongings yank them too far, and their arms windmill in the breath before they—

Tears prick her eyes. She wants Dakadza.

Most of the refugees are human, but enough are dwarves that they're obviously from Salles. She hasn't asked them why, yet, what they're fleeing.

The king of Salles is her uncle, and his prophet is her sister—people who would probably be mentioned in any news. She's terrified of what they might tell her.

The unusually tall elf who initiated this aid chain is beside her, his halting words of encouragement getting smoother, more confident, as he practices the mountaineer. His hair is steel gray, but the skin around the dark eyes are smooth. Geddis isn't sure if that means he's young or if elves just age differently from humans, and that ignorance makes her ashamed. She's lived here too long to have only noticed that now.

She's lived here too long to be this ignorant of others' names, too, but she keeps messing up the prefixes when she tries. Men's names end in –thee, women's in –lee—except for a handful that have some other sound before the –ee and she isn't sure why. She can't remember what that other suffix is, either, and she thinks that this man was one of them.

"Cree," says a shorter, tanned elfin male as he hops over, and the male looks over. They have a brief conversation in telvish.

The tanned male takes Cree's position in line, and Cree gestures for her to follow him through the gate.

Geddis stumbles as she does, her own exhaustion weighing her down. She struggles to shove it away—she hasn't really done anything, not like these people who have fled their homes with what few belongings they can carry!

Inside the gate, some elves—most but not all of them female—have set up tables, handing out food, water. Bandages and tending for the cuts and burns she now realizes are more common than not.

A rough plate and cup are put in her own hands, made of clay and with an odd lack of the red that she's always seen in pottery.

Cree has received his own food, and he stays by her side. His tap on her hand is gentle. "Eat."

He only takes a bite after she does, reminding her of how Dakadza takes care of her. Was he asked to? Dakadza gets along with others so much better than she does.