Rachael Roberts
Achievements (1)
Stories (2/0)
The legend of Brochmail and Xia
Once upon a time there was a boy. At three years old he did not know he would become the king of Wales. He did, however, know that he was cold and hungry and not too far from death. He accepted it, though he was scared; he had never seen a dragon in the flesh. He pulled his arms around himself, trying not to smudge the woad markings that covered his body. Each year a child from the village was picked at random, painted with symbols and images that were older than the village itself, taken to the forest, and left there as a sacrifice to the dragons. This year Brochmail was the chosen child. His mother had explained the ritual as she tucked him into bed. He was not to fight when the dragon came; he had to let it kill him for the village to be protected. The other children must have fought back because, as far as Brochmail knew from the few, small bits of history he had learned from his older brothers, dragons had been attacking people and stealing livestock from this village for as long as anyone knew. Their village wasn’t the only one that sacrificed their children for protection. In fact, every village and town in Wales was required to do it by order of the king. Brochmail was still cold, his skinny arms doing little to protect his flesh from the elements. He knelt by one of the ritual candles that sat in a circle around him, and stretched out his hands to the flame, making sure to not get too close just like his mother had told him. Without warning everything stopped. The wind stopped blowing, the birds stopped singing, the squirrels stopped playing in the autumn leaves. Brochmail felt the hairs stand up on the back of his neck and his heart began to beat rapidly. The dragon must be coming.
By Rachael Robertsabout a year ago in Fiction
- Runner-Up in Mother's Day Confessions Challenge