• Solo • Matters of the Heart

[Vega]

9th Trial of Zi'da during Arc 717

"OW!" Vega glared at her father as the flat of his sword caught her across the back of her legs. "That well stings, Papa!"

Jo'qan laughed to himself and shook his head. "Not as much as it would sting if someone cut you there, Eva," he always used that name. It was her real name, her birth name. Her biqaj name, he called it. No one else called her it, as a rule. "You are distracted, and then some. One more round, and then we will call it a trial." Vega nodded, accepting the assessment of her mental state without question and moving back on the deck of her father's ship, bending her knees slightly and maintaining an open, ready stance. They'd been repeating the same movements, back and forth for a full break and her arms were screaming in tiredness, but Vega did not give in. Now that they were actually sparring, her father was pushing her. So, she tried to focus and to get the conversation they'd had earlier out of her mind, but as she lifted her sword, remembering that her father had told her that she must think of everything as an attack, even a defence. Twisting the blade in her hand, Vega's movements were natural, graceful and fluid and she stopped her father's blow with ease as she actually concentrated.

"Good! That is good! Much better, you are focused now. You have grown into a beautiful woman, Eva, why do you not... OW!" Jo'qan dropped his sword as Vega slapped the flat of her blade against his knuckles. Vega looked at him and her eyes flashed a variety of colours at him. He rubbed his hand, looking at her balefully, and Vega said quite clearly. "It's revenge that is."

Her father looked back at her with innocent eyes. "Revenge? Whatever for, Eva?"

As she lifted her sword and bade him do the same, Vega simply replied with a grim tone. "You know wot for, Papa. You know exactly what for." Accepting the undeniable truth, Jo'qan laughed and so the sparring began again.They both knew, it was revenge for the conversation they'd had, just a short while ago ~ a conversation she had only just come to recognise for what it actually was.

[Vega]

...two breaks earlier.....

"You don't need to help with this, Eva, you didn't eat the food." Jo'qan smiled at his daughter as the pair of them dried the dishes from the meal he and his nephews had eaten the night before.
"Bloody lucky for me, I'd say," she grinned at him as she said that. "Arlo's a better cook than the four of you put together. I'm gonna get fat, but I don't care, I'm well fed." Plus, of course, she wasn't sea sick all the time. That helped. Vega piled the last of the plates up, then put them in their place. It was a small drawer in one of the galley cupboards. The thing, of course, with being on a ship was that everything had to be in place if the seas were rough and so the galley was incredibly well considered. Every inch of storage was used, and also how things were stored was considered. Vega had never really paid that much attention to it before, but now that she was away from it and she and Arlo were managing their own camp, it was interesting to look at in a way that it had not been, of course, when she had lived here.

"He seems a good man, I like him." Jo'qan said and Vega smiled. "I know you'd choose a different life for me, Papa, but I like this one." Her father was silent for a long time, to the point that Vega turned her gaze to him and raised an eyebrow. "What?" She was genuinely concerned by the look on his face, he seemed upset. "What's the matter, Papa?" Jo'qan put down the frypan he was washing and he pulled her to him in a hug, kissing her forehead and then pulling back a little, but putting his hands on to her shoulders and speaking to her with a very serious expression on his face.

"I would never choose a life for you, Eva. I wish only that you live your own life, that you are happy in your own skin, with your own choices. That is all I have ever wanted for you." Vega stood on tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek. "I know tha', Papa. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to sound like I thought you wanted somethin' diff'rent. I don't. You've always taught me to be 'appy with who I am." She gave a grin, then, "I'm jus' not sure tha' I've been very good at learnin' it."

Jo'qan smiled, kissed her on the forehead again and then got back to the washing up. "You are happy now, that is what matters to me. You are, yes?" He knew that she was, he knew his daughter and could tell her moods without need to refer to her eye-colour, tone of voice or any such thing. He knew her because he did.

"I am, Papa. In a way I didn't think I'd be, 'onestly. I didn't know 'ow much I wasn't, til I was." Vega shot him a grin. "An' I'm gettin' better at talkin' clearly, too. Really. You know, I jus' didn't know I could be this content with myself." There were other ways of saying it, undoubtedly more eloquent ones, but that wasn't the point. Besides, this was her and her papa, she didn't need to be more anything and Vega knew it. So, she smiled happily to herself as she took the first of the glasses from him, with a fresh drycloth in her hand.

"So, you will be getting married and starting a family then?" Jo'qan asked.

The sound of the glass shattering against the floor was loud in the small galley kitchen.

[Vega]

"Stay still. Do not step in the glass"

Vega had heard her father say that a dozen times in her life. When they were children, running barefooted around the place, that had been a commonplace response but she hadn't heard it for a number of trials. "Wot? I don't care about the glass. Are you serious?" Jo'qan looked at her, his face entirely impassive. Vega knew that look too well, though, and she shook her head. "No. Papa, no. I'm not doin' that, an' neither's 'e. We. We Are Not Doin' That, so get it out of yer 'ead." Jo'qan blinked in some surprise, an almost folorn look on his face. "An' don't be doin' that, neither. Wot are you thinkin'? I mean, Papa, we've only jus', that is... well, it's all still new, you know." Vega had no intention of getting into a conversation about how long her and Arlo had been intimate. She'd been raised by four males, fundamentally, although two of them were more or less the same age as her. She knew how that conversation went and she had not the slightest interest in sharing those sorts of details with her father.

It didn't even occur to her that he'd be horrified if she did.

No, she just saw him looking at her with large, sad eyes and Vega turned around in surprise as she heard a sound at the galley door. It was Huw, her eldest cousin and he looked between the two of them. "Is everything alright here?" Huw asked and Jo'qan sighed slightly.

"No it bloody well isn't, an' it's at least 'alf your fault you know. You an' yer family this an' family name that. Now you listen to me, sunshine," Vega would have stalked over and poked Huw in the chest if she hadn't known that her father would have a complete fit at her walking in broken glass. "Arlo an' I 'ave been together, I dunno, not long. Like, you know, a couple. An' 'e's off," a wild gesture to her father, "about marriage an' kids. I mean, I'm too young fer that, an I'm too irresponsible, an' I'm.. I'm..."

"Enjoying life too much as you are to be messed around by someone else's plans for you?" It was a fourth voice and there, behind his brother, was her cousin Shon. The last time she'd seen him, he had tried to hold her back from a fight between Arlo and his twin brother, Reese, and Vega had kicked him hard on the shin. Shon had reacted and knocked her to the ground. As was the way of family, or at least theirs, that was forgotten as Vega nodded her head to Shon. "Exactly! I mean.. oh, thanks," she said as Huw stepped forward, his heavy boot crunching the broken glass, and put his hands on her waist, lifting her out of the area. "I mean, you know, I've got things to do."

"I so hear it," Shon said in solemn agreement, "he's trying to arrange a match for me and Reese with some twins from another clan." Vega looked in amazement at her cousin and shook her head. "It's like... 'be 'appy with who you are, an' do it my way', I tell you" She and Shon walked out together, leaving Huw and Jo'qan in the galley.

"Are you alright?" Shon asked her as they left together. "I'm so sorry about hitting you, it was reflex, I swear. Your man cares deeply for you."

"It's a'righ', dun't worry about it. Apologise to 'im, not me. You made a piss poor first impression, I tell you. But 'e's a forgivin' sort." They continued to walk and then Huw and Jo'qan turned to look at each as they heard Vega's guffaw of laughter as Shon replied, "Forgiving? He'd have to be if he loves you."

Huw knelt next to Jo'qan and he looked at his uncle with a knowing expression on his face. "You did that on purpose. With her and them?" Jo'qan smiled and shrugged, picking up the last of the glass. Huw glanced at the place where the two younger ones had just left and asked, "Why, Uncle?"

Jo'qan put his hand on his nephew's shoulder and spoke the simple truth of it. "Because family is everything. And family means respecting each other, and each other's choices." Gesturing out, in the general area, Jo'qan smiled. "Because if we don't support each other, none of us has anyone to lean on. Family matters," he said with a smile, "and it is always a matter of the heart." Huw nodded his head and the two older men got about finishing the dishes.

[Zip]

Overview

Couldn't leave the baby queue alone for an hour, could you? -_-

Really enjoy that sense of community with the Biqaj folk. It was a nice short thread.

@Vega

Points

XP: 10/10

Loot/Injuries/Overstepping

Nah

Knowledge

Skill Knowledge
Blades: Every attack should be a defence
Blades: Open, ready stance
Blades: Sharp, swift strike with the flat of the blade
Blades: Twist the blade to maintain flexibility
Endurance: Practicing for over a break leaves you exhausted
Strength: Sword drills to build up arm strength.

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