The silver against his dark skin was startling and out of place. Earth usually wore gold and it was jarring to her to see the silver ring on his little finger. He saw her staring and held out his left hand. She took it and inspected the band, nothing more than a silver wire with the ends twisted into overlapping spirals.
“What is it?” she asked timidly.
“It was at one time an engagement ring,” he answered. “Now, it’s just a ring.”
Long after he had left her village, she remembered him, and his spiral ring, and his sad eyes.
--
I used to wear a spiral ring like this, which is where the prompt sparked.
This Earth is a young man who also happens to be black, so that was fun. I also discovered that all the elementals of one element share a soul, which is why "Earth usually wore gold".
I love these guys.
She expected Air to make a move, but she didn’t expect them to gang up on her. Fire grabbed her around the waist and pinned one arm behind her back. Water sat on her ankles so she couldn’t kick them away. Air snatched her wrist and yanked up the sleeve before she could wrench away. She heard Fire suck in a breath at her ear, seeing the neat rows of parallel lines crawling their way up her arms like zebra stripes. Air traced a finger over the scars. She flinched.
“Why?” Air whispered.
“To make maple syrup,” she answered bitterly.
--
Mash-up of elementals plus an actual experience with a zebra-striped person.
I enjoy that Earth is never named even though it's in third person limited. And her dark joke at the end made me smile.
Winter is the dead season. For all of us. Maybe Air has it easier than Fire, maybe Water has some new tricks to make it more bearable. But we all struggle. I think I struggle most of all.
Every winter I’m afraid it’s going to be my last. You’d think after three hundred years I’d have a little faith, but it’s difficult to believe I’ll see another spring when I start feeling like an empty husk. When sleep finally overtakes me... it’s hard not to be afraid I won’t wake up.
The worst part is I know someday, I won’t.
--
Oh look it's the elementals again.
I think this is drawn partly from the phoenix myth, where after five hundred years it is reborn in another body.
I think this one is cool when read with the other Earth and winter drabble,
Change In The Weather.
Oh god it was cold.
How long had she been asleep?
Dead grass rustled and bones creaked as she turned over. Her limbs still felt heavy, but her fingers weren’t numb anymore. The thick sap clogging her veins was starting to let her blood flow again. At last.
She stretched and sat up, shaking dried leaves from her hair. A deep breath of cold air stung her throat, but she could taste the spice in the wind. Her scalp tingled at the scent, already pushing up shoots.
The change in the weather had woken her.
Time to be green again.
--
Back to the elementals again! This is obviously an Earth elemental, but one comfortable with this state (unlike
the last one!) I love the sap/blood comparison.
This is partially inspired by
Treasure at the Heart of the Tanglewood, a book I checked out from the library on a whim and fell in love with. (This book is available for purchase at a penny, and I should buy it.)
“Look,” he growls, pushing me to my knees in the mud. “Look at yourself.” Trembling – not wanting to obey, to see, to know – I bend over the glass puddle.
Thin green tendrils sprout from my scalp and pour down in curls amidst tangled brown ringlets. My irises, once grey, now fade from deep brown centers to hazel rims. My face shows evidence of the palest green lines, like veins of leaves under my skin.
As I stare at myself in this watery mirror, I reflect that perhaps now they would let me go. Or is that too much to hope?
--
Corby told me this story, although he's not involved in it at all. A kidnapped and enslaved girl beginning to grow into an Earth elemental, and freaking everyone out (including herself), because, well... she has plants growing in her hair and has leaflike Marks on her face. Although you can see she's ready to use that fear to her advantage.
I like the two interpretations of
Reflection present in this piece. It just feels clever.
