Post by Sir Dmitrii Zurban on Jun 30, 2009 6:17:23 GMT -6
Thunder and Lightning!
Aegraine had been visiting Dmitrii at Lake Manor, Dmi's estate just outside Turas Lan. Both of them had her Father's permission to court, but father Martin did not know she was living their temporarily. Both of them had their own rooms, though connected by a middle door... and both of them were acting with chivalrous manners regarding the courtship... so far!!!
“Gott im Himmel, retten Sie mich vom Donner und der Beleuchtung.”
The storm raged, rumbling like the entire world’s gut was about to toss. Thunder shook the glass window panes and huddled in a heap, wound up with a blanket over her entire head, Aegraine shook as well, for the old fears awoke and she felt in mortal danger again, like then.
A strike in a nearby forest tree was the catalyst and Aegraine grabbed the knit blanket and wound up in it, only a slit for eyes. She ran, bare feet padding across the flooring to the doorway between rooms. One hand she opened the door a slit and asked, between deafening thuds of air resounding off the house walls, “Dmi? It’s me Aegraine. May I sit by the hearth in your room, until the storm is over. I cannot abide storms.”
The storm raged outside whilst Dmitrii slumbered in a deep sleep. To him, the storm was a soothing lullaby, relaxing music for a deep sleep. It was the slight creak of a door opening and a soft voice asking entry that awoke him. “Of course luv… enter… make yourself comfortable.”
Once she got permission, Ae ran over to perch upon a fireside chair, huddled up with her feet up off the floor. She looked like a little ghost, in a knit robe, without face or hands showing. The dying fire flickered a bit of light on her but it was soon overpowered by the latest lightening flash.
“I admit I was afraid of many things when I was young, but my Mother saw to it that I conquered these fears, for she took this as a mainstay of my time training with her, even more than using a bow or sewing up a cut wound. She forbid fear.”
Dmitrii smiled and as she settled into the chair, he flipped back the blanket and rose. His bare form was highlighted by the lightning thru the open window… Slipping on a pair of soft, trousered, undergarments, he walked over to her, kneeling down before her, his hands taking hers. “It’s alright my dear… no need to fear… yu stay as long as yu like…” then he lowered his head and kissed the back of her hands. The half-heart Mizpah pendant swinging freely from his neck.
Then Aegraine began to tell a little story about her past, in between the noise of the terrible storm, as a distraction for herself.
“I was very little, the first time I saw a storm and it was on the ocean, aboard my Father’s ship, the Promise. The waves slapped on over the decks and the cabins and water ran inside through every lit between boards. I clung to the bunk until my Mother took me by force onto the deck and led me to the rails, saying. “Do not be like that, Aegraine. It is nothing but water. And once you learn to swim -why you will bob along the surface like a cork.” Saying this, she tied a rope about my waist and the other end to a large, empty barrel. “There! Voila! Now if the ship capsizes, you will float. Just hold onto the barrel until I come for you.”
That time all I learned was to fear lightening. It struck the main mast and lingered about the uppermost riggings, St. Elmo’s Fire. I was certain the ship was going to burn, but it did not. In the end, that summer with endless of protests from me and Mother throwing me into the lake anyway, I did learn to swim. Reluctantly.
Some years later, when I was about thirteen, still a child, not like the young woman my Mother was at thirteen, the age she was when I was born. She decided it was time to cure me of my fear of lightening, before I was sent with my cousins and servants, to foster with Carlos Incanto, the master of offense war.”
Heavy rain sent torrents sliding along the window panes and an easement of the rumbling allowed her to continue speaking and be heard.
Dmi listened intently as he told her of her youth. This was the first time that she had opened up her past to him, and he smiled. All the while, his fingers stroked the backs of her hand. Here was an interesting sight… Her, in her sleep gown, in the chair by the hearth, her feet up tucked neatly beneath the gown, her entire form wrapped in the blanket like a cocoon… Him, sitting on the floor in front of the chair, his half-naked form, highlighted by flashes of lightning, his hands holding hers. Who would believe such people as Dmitrii, the Weapons Master and Aegraine, the Engineer, would be cleave to each other in a thunderstorm in the man’s own bedchambers… alone. Still, he listened intently; making no comments… he was just happy that she chose him to divulge her past to.
"There was a storm with much lightening, like tonight. Mother persuaded me to go up to the highest level of our home, to face my fear and do away with it. “See? Come to the wall, Aegraine. You can see the entire valley from here, like a campaign map. See?” She leaped up onto the parapet wall and pointed afar. “There come the dark clouds and they boil up and lightening stabs at the earth. See and understand.” She beckoned me to come and stand beside her on the wall, just as she had done when teaching me to dance the victory after war dance.”
What I did see were dark clouds up over our home and the winds throwing them back and forth in some kind of game; to frighten humans perhaps? “Mother. Come away from the wall. Let’s go back inside. This is dangerous, foolish dangerous.” The memory of fire at the top of our ship’s mast warned me.
“Oh Aegraine! Don’t be like that. Here. Take my hand.” She reached out for me, to make sure I got upon the wall, but I shrunk back to the tower doorway. I was not dealing with my fears at all.
Then in one instant a wide light golden fire in the rain lightning bolt hit the tower! It struck where my Mother stood, her hand out to me and I was thrown by the force of it into the tower and tumbled down some steps to a landing. The stone foundation shook and there was a roiling loud series of sounds and then silence.
“Mother?” I scrambled to my feet, my boots sliding on the now wet stairs. “Mother?” I raced to where the stones of the wall were ajar from the strike. The air smelled of o-zone and singed hair.
As she told her story, he listened… and when the time came of foreboding in her story, he tightened the clasp upon her hands into a reassuring squeeze. Saying nothing he hoped his grasp would reassure her.
There was what used to be my tall, lovely Mother, a singed burned and bald being, barely breathing and staring out with sightless eyes. The rain was less, but it hissed on her now smoldering clothing. I just stood in shock for a moment and then, “I will get help! I will get Father and the healers! I’m coming right back!” There was no choice but to leave her there alone, not evening knowing if she could hear me or not.
They came and carried her to her room and let me sit in the hall. Until the next morning, my Father woke me and said it was time for the party of us to depart for the Incanto’s Hall. “Your Mother is resting, child. The healers are with her and do not fret; they have creams to restore her complexion and her hair will grow back. Next time you see here, she will be as you recall her.” I wanted to believe him, so I did.”
Came back from my fostering, my Mother was gone, her apartments empty, save for her looking glass. I never saw my Mother again. I was so close to being up on that wall with her, stuck by lightening. There was some guilt on Ae’s part, for not being able to deal with her fear of storms and what happened to Aurilla.
Dmitrii caught the apprehension in her voice… no longer did the tenderness of losing her mother pain her, but it appeared to be some guilt upon her part for her mother’s death. “Luv… tis nay yer error… Twas meant to be… At least yu are here with me… for if yu had taken yer Mother’s hand, then yu too would be buried with her… Skye would not have the experienced Engineer they have , yer Father would not have his wife, nor his lil Grainie…” he winked as he said her nickname… a mention of it by her Father in her absence. “And I would not be sitting here with the woman I love…” he smiles, that familiar and reassuring crinkling of the neatly trimmed beard.
Flash and lightening struck a tall tree in the neighboring woods, sending Aegraine completely into the knit gray blanket she was wearing over her nightgown. The window panes shook with the vibrations of that strike and Ae kept still, close to the safety of Dmi’s hearth, little so the lightning might not find her.
Her hands slipped from his and the blanket swallowed her. Dmitrii chuckled a bit and his voice soft… “How can yu command cannon with such earth rattling power, but thunder sends yu hiding…” He pulled the blanket from her head and his hands pushed aside errant hair from her face... looking right at her. “Ae… now tis my turn to tell a story…” he grinned and nodded at her… his voice was soft and soothing…
“Although most of the pagan gods of Kievan Rus have disappeared without a trace… but an exception might be made for Volos and Perun. They were pagan gods who seem to have been reincarnated in the Christian beliefs as St Vlasii and the prophet Ilya (Elijah)… Volos and Perun are even mentioned in the Rus' Primary Chronicle, a history of early Kievan Rus. Together, they are sworn upon in peace agreements between Rus overlords and Byzantine emperors to this day. In this facet, he is mentioned as a god of war and nobility, who punishes oath breakers with death in battle.” He smiles mixing myth and fact.
Aegraine concentrated on the story, face and hands now exempted from the blanket wrap, she concentrated on both the story and the calming tone of Dmitrii' voice.
Patting her hand he continues… “Saint Vlasii, formerly the pagan god, Volos, is depicted on Rus religious icons, surrounded by cows and sheep… the saint of cattle. Icons of Vlasii were carried in the ceremonies, of many villages and towns, that marked the spring exodus of cows into the pastures after the melting of winter snows.
Myth has it that Perun, god of war, warriors, thunder, and fertility of nature… and he has long been associated by Rus scholars with the thunderstorms as a sign of his wrath… Thunder as an instrument of divine retribution, and lightning as his punitive weapons. He has been also associated with arrows and oaks. Some say thunder was caused by the rumblings of the wheels of his chariot as it hurled across the skies; and lightning was his weapon to dispel the demons of darkness and renew the power of the sun…” he smiles at her and continues...
“Now, Volos is Perun's brother, and is the caretaker of the Dead, and of Things Underground. He is also the patron of miners and the merchant class. His symbols are the golden coin symbolizing wealth, and the gravedigger's spade. Myth has it that he appears as a huge serpent or dragon… and Volos is also mentioned as god of cattle and peasants, who will punish oath-breakers with diseases. In legends over the years, Volos has taken the profile of various pagan gods… Now in the Rus belief, the world is deemed as a tree… the limbs reaching toward heaven… the roots delving deep into the ground toward hell, or the Underworld…” he spoke softly attempting to set the tone of the story…
“But there is a story of those two… The reason of hostility between the two gods I spoke of, is Volos' theft of Perun's son, wife, or, cattle. It is also an act of challenge: Volos, in the form of a huge serpent, slithers from the caves of the Underworld and coils upwards the Rus world tree towards Perun's heavenly domain. Perun retaliates and attacks Volos with his lightning bolts. Volos flees, hiding or transforming himself into trees, animals or people. In the end, Volos is killed by Perun, and in this ritual death, whatever Volos stole is released from his battered body in form of rain falling from the skies. This Storm myth, as it is generally referred to by scholars, explained to ancient Rus people as the changing of seasons through the year. The dry periods were interpreted as chaotic results of Volos' thievery. Storms and lightning were seen as divine battles. The following rain was the triumph of Perun over Volos and re-establishment of world order.” Dmi would watch her facial expressions as the storm raged on outside the windows…
Storms as battles, it was a likeness that appealed to her imagination. Aegraine began to unfold from her tight cowering in that hearthside chair, even to allowing her feet to dangle in the air, for the chair was built in Dmitrii's proportions, tall for her. She kept her face in direction to watch while he told the story, not looking at the window where the storm continued.
Then he continued, his face offering a reassuring smile… “The myth was recurring of course. The death of Volos was never permanent; he would reform himself as a serpent who would shed its old skin and would be reborn in a new body. Although in this particular myth, he plays the negative role as bringer of chaos, but Volos was not seen as an evil god by the ancient Rus. They believed that the duality and conflict of Perun and Volos does not represent the dualistic clash of good and evil; rather, it is the opposition of the natural principles of earth, water and substance.”
Dmitrii had rubbed the back of her hands as he continued… “Finally, after Christianization, the beliefs, myths, and legends merged and were transformed into the veneration of Volos and Perun as Saint Vlasii and the prophet Ilya (Elijah).” He smiles… “I have icons of those two around the house… Vlasii in the stables… and Ilya in the weapons room…” he winks… “My favorite…”
"You do? I would like to see them, maybe tomorrow? I have had only a glance at your weapons room, so far." Aegraine gave one brief glance to the hearthfire and back to Dmitrii's face, "Dmi? I feel I can tell you anything, you know?"
There the pair sat, holding hands… together in the sanctuary of their home… each offering something to the other… Dmitrii just smiles…
Dmitrii smiled and looked at Ae… “Upon the morrow then, we shall investigate the weapons room…” he chuckled and patted her hand. "I am glad yu feel that way... Isn't that how we should be??"
Outside, the storm raged longer than expected… or in fact that it was more than one storm but several moving thru the city. Taking her hand, he led her across the bedchambers to the door. “You must get some sleep, unless yu desire to sleep the day away…” Leading her into her own room and to her bed. He straightened her blanket and indicated her to get in…
And when she had, he covered her up with the blanket. Unexpectedly, he laid down upon the blanket, next to her. His arm lay across her belly, his steel-grey eyes looking to her. “Sleep… I shall stay until the storm passes…”
"That is so caring, Dmi...I appreciate you staying for a little while." Aegraine could still hear the rumblings of the weather system at a distance, moving. Was it moving in or away, that was in question. She held her half of the heart pendant necklace in one hand and rested, slipping off into sleep with her head inclined in Dmitrii's direction. His arm across her grounded Ae and she settled comfortable to sleep until morning. Sleep during a storm, even one at a distance was a break through as was speaking about those terrible events.
“It’s because I do care so much my dear… I shall stay as long as yu wish…”
Funny thing weather. To some, they wish for rain… some wish for warmer weather… Some can’t wait til the humid days of summer are over and the cool rains of autumn soaks the ground. But this evening, the weather was bit violent… Round three of the thunderstorm was nearing and the thundering in the distant grew. Still Dmitrii lay beside her and with each flash of lightning, he caressed her before the boom. Sleep… she was asleep and soon after he did… still anchoring his beloved Ae.
Now, the dawning of a new day brought a new phase of weather.... and their relationship. As the sun broke the horizon in the east, its rays burst thru the open window of her room; and shown upon the two just as they lay together thru the night.