WC 900
Her attention wavered between the conversation she tried to hold with the women and her brother’s fishing expedition. It was impossible to look away as Niro’s line began trembling again, and he struggled to pull in whatever unfortunate sea-dweller was stuck on the other end of the line. She rooted for Niro silently at first, but couldn’t contain her excitement when it began to look like Niro was actually going to get this one. She bounced a little in her seated position, “Yeah, Niro, here it comes!” She cheered as he hoisted the flapping, scaly animal out of the waves. It was almost comical all over again when she saw the size of the fish, and she covered her mouth with her hand, but did well in suppressing the giggle.
Turning back to Liliya and Zasha, she celebrated, “He got it!”
After her brief distraction she easily ebbed back into the conversation, hearing everything Liliya was telling her about reading, books, and languages. It had never occurred to her that the English alphabet she knew was not the only alphabet that existed, short of a very few variations wolves had made in some Luperci scriptures (which seemed as commonplace as the English letters). At this thought her eyes grew round. “Oh my god, really? They have another alphabet?” She was floored, absolutely thrilled, the hackles on the back of her neck bristled with excitement. “I. . . I never even thought about that existing. I guess I just kind of thought what I’ve been used to was all there was. It’s not easy finding readable books since paper is so temporary, so the most legible things that weren’t Luperci-made all came from the States, where they mostly spoke English. If you ever wanted some lessons. . . on reading English that is. . . I'd be happy to help you.”
She turned to Rurik as he ambled over, grinning as he held up Niro’s catch, clearly proud of his young pupil. Clapping her hands together, she commended her brother as Rurik handed the fish to Liliya and then offered up the vodka bottle. “Oh, thank you,” she said as she accepted the bottle from him and put it to her lips without questioning what was inside. All she knew was that it was something to drink, and she was grateful! She quickly tipped the bottle back and then heard Rurik say ‘. . .does have a bit of kick. . .’ Kick? What is he talking about? And then she knew.
Her eyes widened as the pungent liquid poured into her mouth, more than a greenhorn like herself would prefer to gulp down, and in her surprise she quickly guzzled the mouthful of flaming liquid. She choked and coughed and the breath burned in her throat and stung her mouth. Tears welled in her eyes as she looked at Rurik and sputtered for breath after the hearty swig of vodka. She shoved the bottle back towards him, and took a minute before she could remember how to talk. “Oh. . . Oh my. . . that burns. . . make it stop. . . what is that?! That's finest? Rurik, I'm sorry but, I think it may have gone bad.” It wasn't her intention to offend Rurik, but she had truly never tasted alcohol before nor was previously aware of its taste. She was well aware of its boisterous effect on the spirit, though.
Wiping the tears from her eyes, she turned back to Lilya and Zasha and tried to pick up where they had left off, though suddenly she began to feel fuzzy, and even friendlier than usual (if that could happen). “Well, I know a lot of stories. . .” her concentration was a little off, but she kept going. “Like this one about a girl named Antigone. . . it’s actually a play that people used to act out. . . I guess it was ancient even for the humans. It’s about this girl who’s brothers are killed at war, but one is a traitor, so the king says she can’t bury him. She defies the king and decides to perform burial rites for him anyway, and gets caught, so the king orders her execution. Only there is this prophet, you see, who says the gods have said what the king is doing is wrong, so the king orders Antigone to be sealed in a tomb and fed, but kept alive. The girl ends up killing herself, and then her fiancée, the king’s son, kills himself, and then the king’s wife kills herself, and then the king goes mad in despair.” She looked down at her hands as her voice trailed off, suddenly feeling foolish for summarizing such a depressing story at such a happy occasion. “Well, its pretty grim when you sum it up like that, but it’s really kind of neat if you read it. You get a lesson out of it, about how strong the girl was to defy the king and the men, for the love of her family. Not everything is that dark, only the ancient stuff.”
She nodded once, looking at the others with an awkward grin, and all of a sudden a little more of Rurik’s fire-drink didn’t sound like such a bad idea. Glancing to the gray Russian, she asked, “Um, could I try a little more of that?”