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15minuteficlets which updates every sunday. They've been around for a year already, and I just found them now.
The Book of Balance said that you were to gather your artifact at the cusp of night and day, on the nights of balance. Precisely at that moment, you cast your net, and brought up what the bright half of the year would bring you, and toss back what the dark half gave...
Until the temple to Her was built. Only the Leader cast his (or her) net at the precise moment, these days; everyone waited in line behind, some waiting long into the night. Yris was one hundred and fortieth in the line, and Yris was happy, for she had been two hundred and twelfth just a half year before. Such a leap did not go unnoticed. the murmurs of those who had come and waited all day rose as the blinded Hands of Balance guided her further and further along the line, until she stood between Fat Hjothar, the Brewer, and (even Fatter) Tinis, a weaver. She left her own folk - the leatherworkers, the dyers, the fishers - far behind her, heart swelling with each step she made on the salt-smoothed boards, passing the lanterns of Compassion, Distance, Sympathy, and Work, very nearly at the foot of the lanterns of Decision.
Those who stood ahead of Decision were rather more valued than those who stood behind, at the moment when the sun sank below Her waves. And she was nearly there. Nearly there, and her heart leapt as the centipede line raised one right foot after another and moved forward, for the leader had cast his net and drawn up Her omen.
Murmurs rippled backward, hushed exclamations as the Leader rushed back, heedless of humble bare feet and dripping nets, clutching what the sea had given him for the bright half of the year, racing to hide it from the people who waited. But they saw it: clutched in his arms, crusted with age and sea-stone, a copper helmet of the Freed.
War was coming.
Yris knew then why she had come so far in the line.
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The Book of Balance said that you were to gather your artifact at the cusp of night and day, on the nights of balance. Precisely at that moment, you cast your net, and brought up what the bright half of the year would bring you, and toss back what the dark half gave...
Until the temple to Her was built. Only the Leader cast his (or her) net at the precise moment, these days; everyone waited in line behind, some waiting long into the night. Yris was one hundred and fortieth in the line, and Yris was happy, for she had been two hundred and twelfth just a half year before. Such a leap did not go unnoticed. the murmurs of those who had come and waited all day rose as the blinded Hands of Balance guided her further and further along the line, until she stood between Fat Hjothar, the Brewer, and (even Fatter) Tinis, a weaver. She left her own folk - the leatherworkers, the dyers, the fishers - far behind her, heart swelling with each step she made on the salt-smoothed boards, passing the lanterns of Compassion, Distance, Sympathy, and Work, very nearly at the foot of the lanterns of Decision.
Those who stood ahead of Decision were rather more valued than those who stood behind, at the moment when the sun sank below Her waves. And she was nearly there. Nearly there, and her heart leapt as the centipede line raised one right foot after another and moved forward, for the leader had cast his net and drawn up Her omen.
Murmurs rippled backward, hushed exclamations as the Leader rushed back, heedless of humble bare feet and dripping nets, clutching what the sea had given him for the bright half of the year, racing to hide it from the people who waited. But they saw it: clutched in his arms, crusted with age and sea-stone, a copper helmet of the Freed.
War was coming.
Yris knew then why she had come so far in the line.