Honey and Sky | Jean Kirstein x OC

1 | New Beginnings

Year 847

"What time do we leave tomorrow?"

"Leave? What's tomorrow?"

Lena would have felt a rush of anger in her chest were it not for the fact that she wasn't entirely surprised. They had forgotten. Despite all the times she'd mentioned it, shyly so as not to cause trouble and avoid being scolded, the whole family seemed to have forgotten. Planting herself in the living room of the small house, hands with fingers anxiously intertwined, she forced herself to speak.

"The Training Corps... Tomorrow is the first day."

Lena saw the realization hit her uncle's face, along with an expression of deep annoyance at the inconvenience to the aforementioned.

"You still at it with that bullshit about joining the Garrison?"

"Tomorrow is market day, why didn't you say so before?," her aunt, who had been listening as she knitted in her armchair by the fire, coldly chimed in.

Lena didn't want another scolding, so she answered as politely as she could. "I've reminded you several times..."

The woman put her knitting needles aside. "If you had, this wouldn't be a problem, don't you think?"

Lena felt the rage move inside her body, hot as the fire burning in the stove, but she kept silent, as she did every time her uncle, aunt or cousins tried to twist her words. It'd been that way ever since she'd had to move in with them several years ago, after an illness took her parents. There was no one else who could take care of her. Not that they wanted to either, something she was very aware of despite her young age. But they decided that an extra pair of hands would come in handy to help around the house, so they took her in.

"Well... If you've really made up your mind, I have to stop by Trost tomorrow anyway, so I can drop you off at the gates," the man said while going back to busying himself with cleaning his rifle, which he used to hunt the animals he then sold. "Then you're on your own, I can't stray any further. We leave at dawn."

Great.

Lena was no longer surprised by anything from that family. It was finally time to leave that house for good, which was why she had decided to join the Training Corps.

That night she went to bed quite content for the first time since... She couldn't even remember. She was looking forward to meeting children her own age, to making friends. To escaping the psychological abuse she'd endured every day since she had to move in with her dad's brother. To becoming strong and helping others.

The next day she got up before her uncle. The night before she'd packed a small backpack with her few belongings: a few changes of clothes, toiletries, the comb her mother used and a jacket from her dad. It was quite big, but it was comfortable and protected her from the cold better than any other.

She went to the toilet to wash off the sleep and brush her teeth. She gathered water in her cupped hands and brought it to her face, scrubbing hard at the freckled skin, inherited from her mother, until it was red and the pale eyelashes were free of gunk. She ran her wet hands through her red hair to smooth the bird's nest that was left after sleeping and parted it into two large locks. She made two braids and tied them at the end, one on each side of her face. Finally, she tried to flatten her bangs, pressing them against her forehead. That was the hairstyle she used to do since her mother was no longer in her life.

She stared at herself in the mirror for a while and sighed. She wasn't worried about her appearance, but she always ended up unintentionally drawing attention to herself. Usually for the worse, as there was never a shortage of cruel children to make fun of her freckles or her hair. At his uncle's house, hair color was normal. Freckles, on the other hand... Her cousins never missed an opportunity to remind her of what they thought of her "spots". Maybe at Training Corps she met other children with freckles? With red hair? She could only wish. She averted her eyes from the mirror and exited the toilet.