Lost

Writers: Yvonne, Eimi
Date Posted: 19th March 2006

Characters: Mariss, Jio
Description: Jio and Mariss find out that they're both survivors
Location: Amber Hills Hold
Date: month 11, day 2 of Turn 3

Jio's worry for his wife took precedence over his fatigue, his thirst, even his growling stomach. Thank Faranth Daigoro finally ordered him to sit down for a few minutes. He had been light headed from a lack of food and hard work. The journeyman had been too concerned about Miryene to eat that morning, the earthquake had wiped out the kitchens in both the Vintner Hall and the Hold. Now the Woodsmith Hall was scrambling to find food for two Halls and a Hold's worth of people. Well, those who had survived. Some of the cot's kitchens which hadn't been badly damaged had been fired up. But food was only a dull ache compared to the fear of what Miryene was going through. Even sending his two flits back to keep an eye on things for him, to be ready in case he should be needed, gave him no relief from the fear. **Shards, I'm her husband. I should be with her...**

"Jio?" Someone gently touched his shoulder, and when she saw it was him, reached over to give him a hug. "Shards, I'm so glad to see you.
It's such a mess... I don't know what to do."

"Mariss?" he whispered, pulling her closer. Jio hadn't seen her in months, but it felt good to see someone familiar. "I'm so glad you're safe."

Mariss closed her eyes and let herself be comforted, to forget about the charred, muddied ruin that used to be the Hold. If she never saw another bloodied face again, she'd be happy. But it couldn't last.
"I- they can't find Vivvi. And Da's gone off somewhere - will the earth shake again?"

"Yes, I think it will," Jio whispered as he rested his chin on top of her head. Everything he had ever heard about earthquakes told him that more aftershocks would come. He had heard the Headwoman was missing. There were many people missing. There were many people being found, too. And most of them were broken beyond recognition. He swallowed hard as he remembered the child they had found, still clutched in his mother's arms, both of them crushed by wood and stone.

Mariss was still shaking like a leaf when she pulled away, and had gone grey beneath her freckles. She sat down beside Jio and tucked her hands beneath her knees to keep them warm, suddenly more frightened than she had been when she'd been trapped in the dark. The earth would shake again... that was a betrayal of everything she knew. The sun rose, the moons set, the seasons changed, and the earth stood still beneath her feet. Her world felt turned upside down. She swallowed thickly. "What about- your wife?"

"I don't know," Jio said, shaking his head slowly, feeling as if he were lost in a fog. "I really don't know. She's having her baby now. She could be fine. She could be in a lot of pain. It could be finished." Things could be going wrong... No, he couldn't think that. She was fine, the healer had said so. And Pom would come to him if things were wrong. Shards, things better not be going wrong...

"She's having a _baby_? Right _now_?!" Mariss put a bandaged hand against her lips to cover her gasp. The vintner nodded numbly. "She started this morning. Before the quake."

"But she's okay? You've seen her since the earthquake?"

"I was with her when the quake happened, but soon after I was conscripted to help fight the fire in the Hall. And then to come here to search through... this," he waved a heavy hand in the direction of the pile of shattered stone and splintered wood. "I won't see her until we're allowed to go home. Or unless..." He didn't want to even think of the possibility. "Unless I'm needed."

"Women have babies all the time. I'm sure that she'll be just fine,"
Mariss lied. Childbirth frightened her as badly as the earthquake did
- she'd lost her mother that way, before she'd had a chance to meet her.

"The baby is early. And this maybe be Miryene's only chance..." He shook his head, trying to forget what was happening at the Hall. "So are you all right?"

She held up her bandaged hands. "I'm cut up and sticky, but I'm all right."

Jio gently took one of her hands in his and turned over back and forth, looking at the bandaging, feeling almost guilty that he had come through the quake unscathed. "It must have been terrifying."

She wouldn't meet his eyes, instead staring at the muddy ground between their toes. "I'd rather not talk about it."

"Of course. I'm sorry," he said as he dropped her hands, feeling guilty for bringing back obviously painful memories.

"It's all right." She took a deep breath to chase away the dark, and stared out over the ruins of the Hold. People crawled all over it like bugs, pulling people and undamaged objects out from between sandstone blocks and splintered wood. "Da is running himself ragged.
I don't think he knows what to do anymore. He won't talk to me."

Jio rubbed at his face wearily. "None of us know what do to anymore, except dig."

"What do you think is going to happen? With- all _this_." Mariss waved her hand vaguely to encompass the Hold and the surrounding lands.

"There is some talk of leaving," the journeyman said with a shrug. "The Hold is uninhabitable."

Somewhere else. Somewhere... she'd always dreamed of traveling and seeing other Holds, and maybe one day even a Weyr. Or the sea. But now that the choice was made for her... "I've never lived anywhere else," she said in a small voice.

"But there is no Amethyst Cliff anymore, Mariss. You can't stay here."

**But I don't want to go...** She sniffed and tucked her bandaged hands back into the crook of her knees, blinking back tears. Shards and shells, if she started crying now, she didn't think she'd ever be able to stop. "What will you and your wife do? And- the baby?"

"Go wherever the Hall goes. It won't be so bad," he said, finally noticing that the thought really bothered her. "You'll be with your father."

"I know." She smiled a bit - the thought that they'd be separated was ridiculous. But everything would be _different_. The Hold would be different. The hills would be different, and the orchards, and gardens and the people. It wouldn't be _home_. Shards, she was homeless during a Pass.

Jio nodded. He knew that how upsetting change could be. "Well, you know, journeymen move around. We have to get used to new homes from time to time. You learn that the people are what makes it a home."

"I guess." But it wasn't the same, and it didn't make her feel any less... lost. Journeymen had a _choice_. All she had was blood and death and rubble.

Last updated on the April 11th 2006

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