Force of Nadia

1

The warmth of the fading summer sun beat down gentle rays against the pages of an open book that sat on a girl's lap. The girl was young, barely reaching her seventeenth birthday and, like many girls of such an age, believed she knew everything she needed to. She'd faced much in the past ten years and finally thought she was ready for the life fate had set out for her.

Estille had stopped reading whatever she was trying to absorb and thought about those times, so long ago. People had often told her that children were resilient creatures, unlike parents and other elders. Her experiences had proved this irrefutably – her childhood was robbed in its twilight, when she peaked at age ten or eleven years. Her age wouldn't be important, she was a diseased child, and that would be all the history books would write.

She looked back at the page before her, the words she had just read through were a blur in her mind, insignificant as her thoughts wondered. She sighed as the tree she sat at sighed with her, the leaves whispering in the sombre wind. That child was naïve of the future, so sure that she would live even in the mouth of that endless void. How she got such confidence in the face of death, Estille wished she knew – for that magic was what she needed now more than ever.

She was a growing woman; with a poor sword arm, a fine firearm and faster than most the girls and boys of her age. But beyond the walls of Nadia, she had heard and caught glimpses of a different life – of flowing gowns, sparkling jewels and beauties described in far-fetched tales. She had read about them and about the lines of Kings that had come and gone so many years passed.

But the book on her lap wasn't some common book on such small tales. It was the history of heraldry in Abellium, with all the families detailed lines all the way up until her generation. Estille thought it was less a book and more a means to reach the upper shelves of her father's vastly more interesting study. As she continued reading, she heard someone approach, and readied herself for some kind of pestering.

"At ease." Tali replied, masking her voice with an overly dramatic impersonation of her father's gruff tones.

Estille relaxed, preferring Tali's pestering to any other. "You're telling me to be at ease now you're here? If anything, I should be more on guard."

"Oh, come on, princess. It was one pillow." Tali smiled. "And besides, I didn't even hide a rock in it that time."

"Lucky me." Estille easily smiled back.

Tali was a small girl, but not to be underestimated. Her hair was blonde, roughspun straw atop a soft brow with eyes the colour of roasted chestnuts. She held herself with confidence few people could muster and was quick to turn glum faces into smiles when she saw them. Her sword-arm was infinitely better than Estille's and she was stronger and quicker as well; usually the first to leap into fights and the last to consider words.

"What're you reading?"

"You tell me." Estille folded back the book to show her the title. Her eyes watched Tali intently as she studied the lettering on the leather-bound book.

"T-The... His... His-tor-ey... Of..." Tali felt the pressure after she got past 'history' and her heart raced as she had no clue what the final word was.

She was stubbornly impatient, despite merely a novice she had no inclination to take her time without throwing herself head-first at the problem. Her first two tries didn't help with this and her third ended in a sullen curse. But Estille was a patient teacher and had to be to be able to teach Tali a lick of anything – so she made her try again but slower, taking each sound and part in her stride. "Her... Ald... Rey?"

"Close enough." Estille smiled widely. "Heraldry, yeah? Say it with me."

"Heraldry. Herald-ry!" Tali repeated. "Makes sense, don't you think?"