Work Text:
Kasia was a Dragon-born girl. Like the rest of them born between one October and the next in the wrong year, she knew what that meant. There was no way to forget that her life was not her own with that hanging over her head
Of course it was made worse by the fact that she was the favorite to be taken by the Dragon. While any of the eleven girls born in the tribute year had a chance of being chosen, there had been an unspoken agreement amongst those who knew her that she would be the one.
So many of her relationships had been tainted by that. Kasia could never think of her mother but to hear her urging her to be brave and do the things she was afraid of.
Her seventeenth year, the year that was in all likelihood her last at home in Dvernik, Kasia felt the constant flow of time like a living thing, urging her to make the most of every moment. Every day she was out of the house as soon as she could manage.
It wasn’t as hard as it should have been. She knew the other village girls born of different years spent most if not all of their days at home, doing household chores or minding their younger siblings. But for herself, the chance to escape couldn’t be ignored Some days as she walked out of her home, out of the corner of her eye, she saw her mother, looking as though she wanted to say something. But she never did.
Sometimes as Kasia did chores or walked through the village on an errand, she imagined ways to get out of being the Dragon’s choice. She looked at the smith’s son and considered asking him to meet her when the moon came out. She saw the bookseller’s cart and pictured hiding in the back, pulling empty bags that smelled of paper and ink over her. She talked with Agnieszka and wondered how she would react if Kasia asked her to run away from the Valley together.
It was the last that she thought of the most. How could she not when Nieszka was her daily companion? Their entire life they had grown side-by-side. Even as her mother had pulled her away from her other peers, reminding her of a duty she did not understand, Agnieszka had held on tightly.
Agnieszka’s relationship with her parents was so different from Kasia’s. Agnieszka’s mother continually present, unlike Wensa who even when in the room seemed to be at a distance. Agnieszka’s father often speaking with his daughter, offering advice and courtesy, when her own father shrouded himself in silence.
Kasia saw the way Agnieszka’s mother and father looked at her, with mingled hope and shame. She was a way of keeping their daughter. Someone who could fall naturally into the Dragon’s line of sight, obscuring their own child. Kasia couldn’t fault them for it. She knew most parents wanted to do all they could to protect their own child. She imagined in their own way that was what her parents were trying to do.
As much as Kasia pictured herself away, she couldn’t follow through on any of her plans. Once on a rare occasion that the girls had spoken of the Dragon, Agnieszka had mentioned her father’s belief that the Dragon girls who returned to the valley didn’t remain because they had learned to fear the Wood. Agnieszka’s response had been that they all feared the Wood. Kasia agreed, how could she not? And yet, the idea of leaving their home seemed so impossible. And as far as she knew, no other Dragon-born girl had escaped in any such fashion as she imagined. Why should she be any different?
Still, her plans for escape didn't’ disappear. The only time they faded was with Agnieszka.
With Agnieszka, Kasia talked of the future. One where neither of them had been selected, where it hadn’t even been an event in their life history.
“Perhaps you learn a trade and I become a bookseller,” Agnieszka might start.
“Or you might follow your father and become the village’s first female woodcutter,” Kasia teased. “You’re tall enough.” They would laugh until tears leaked from their eyes at their own silliness.
If it was childish playing a game of pretend, acting as if there wasn’t a limit on her life as she knew it, then so be it. Her fellow Dragon-born girl and only true friend, Agnieszka, was willing to play the game along with her.
As October loomed, their diversion got ever more complicated, both of them working to keep the illusion. But it couldn’t stop time from bringing them closer and closer to the day the Dragon would choose another girl.
...
At the changing of the seasons from summer to fall, Dvernik held its annual harvest festival. It was one of the town’s rowdiest holidays and that was no less true true in a year that the Dragon would take one of their own. Traditionally, one unmarried young woman wore a crown made from grain as she visited all the most important parts of their village while the villagers paraded behind her. The procession ended with a blessing from the priest.
Kasia and Agnieszka walked together in the procession as they did every year. Their mothers’ friendship would have ensured it even if their own had not.
They weren’t close to the girl wearing the crown but when the crowd stopped they had a decent view of proceedings. Kasia knew the honored maiden well enough. A farmer’s daughter, Basia was only a year younger.
As they watched the girl receive the blessing, Agnieszka grabbed Kasia’s hand and whispered fiercely in her ear. “That should’ve been you.“
It was an unseasonably warm day for September, but Kasia shivered. Even in the midst of all the people, she thought she could pick out Agnieszka’s particular scent, fresh dirt and a wild, sweet floral bouquet.
“Next year,” Agnieszka promised, squeezing her hand. Kasia forced a smile, desperate to keep up the game. The entire day, she had been carefully keeping her mind blank of what was coming in the next week.
At the end of the ceremony, as the crowd was dispersing, Kasia asked, “Would you meet with me tonight, Nieszka? After dark?”
“Of course,” Agnieszka told her.
.....
By the time Kasia and Agnieszka met in the road in front of their homes, the sun had set hours before. Only the most determined of festival goers were still celebrating and the rest of the village was abed. The air, which had been so warm earlier in the day, had taken on a slight chill that was a reminder of the changing seasons.
The girls walked without speaking to the wood. It wasn’t the Wood, but like the rest of the valley there was no part that wasn’t touched by the strangeness of the magic haunting their Wood. The flowers followed Agnieszka, clinging to her skirts, which were dirty enough already from the walk. Kasia watched them from the corner of her eye but Agnieszka didn’t seem to notice at all.
At the first small clearing they stopped, reaching a consensus with a glance. Agnieszka sat on the ground with a sigh, patting the ground beside her after a moment in invitation.
Kasia didn’t take it immediately, looking down at Agnieszka. It was an unusual position, Agnieszka had been taller than her since puberty.
“It is late,” Agnieszka said. It wasn’t a question but Kasia knew Agnieszka wondered why she had asked her to meet. They spent so much time together during the day, every day. It should be enough. With anyone else it would be too much, Kasia thought.
Here in the dark, being together was quite different. Kasia looked at Agnieszka and let herself notice the things she tried to ignore during the day. Agnieszka, with her lovely curly brown hair. Agnieszka, with long sun-browned limbs. Agnieszka, who was her only true friend.
If she was meant to be brave, how could it not be meant for bravery in this too, Kasia wondered.
After another moment, Kasia sat next to her friend. Agnieszka smiled at her, as she always did, and it was enough. Kasia leaned in and pressed her mouth softly to Agnieszka’s. Her eyes were open so she saw Agnieszka’s eyes widen and then flutter closed. Only then did she let her own shut and breath in Agnieszka’s sweet scent.
For a moment she was absurdly happy. It was like the freedom she so desperately craved was wrapped up in the sensation of kissing Agnieszka.
After a few moments their closeness didn’t feel like enough, the fleeting thought of what hung over the two of them gripped her. Kasia was desperate as she pushed one hand into Agnieszka’s hair and drew her closer with the other hand around her waist. She sensed Agnieszka smile briefly against her lips as she leaned in Kasia’ arms, pressing their bodies flush.
Kasia felt as if all her suppressed longing was wildfire burning through her body. Their sweet kiss, tinged with desperation and hope, blossomed into a deeply passionate one.
After a few long moments, Agnieszka pulled back slightly to breathe. The air was shockingly cold on Kasia’s face. Her lips tingled from kissing and she pressed them together, trying to hold on to the feeling.
Agnieszka reached a hand to touch Kasia’s cheek and pulled it away wet.
“Of course, even crying, you’re beautiful,” Agnieszka said. She was trying to tease but an unfathomable sadness shone through.
Kasia startled herself by laughing. She couldn’t bring herself to joke in response or say anything that she should. She wondered if there were any right words to offer to a childhood friend you had kissed when you knew might leave for ten years.
Agnieszka sighed before reaching a hand to Kasia’s shoulder this time.
“It seems a waste not to use the time we have,” Agnieszka said, hopefully.
Afterward there were leaves on their clothes and in their hair. Before they parted in the slowly lifting darkness, Agnieszka reached out to pull some from Kasia’s long braid. “Your mother might ask where it came from,” Agnieszka said.
“My mother would not ask me anything,” Kasia told her.
....
After that night, time seemed to only exist in moments. The first of October was a scarce week after the festival and Kasia hated herself for all the time she had wasted wondering. In the summer there had been so many warm nights she and Agnieszka could have met, rainy spring evenings that would have required meeting in someone’s barn out of sight, or earlier still, finding warm hidden spaces in the the winter darkness when the fall seemed so far away as to be impossible.
While Kasia and Agnieszka spent as much as time ever together, it was not enough. Kasia hated every moment they were apart. Agnieszka seemed to agree and it was she ensured they would spend the day before October first together..
Kasia wasn’t sure what Agnieszka had said to her parents but when she asked “Will you come with me today?” it was impossible to do anything but agree.
Kasia followed Agnieszka into the woods, where they made a little fire and roasted chestnuts. The delicious smell and crackling fire made the day feel cozy. For half a moment, the old game of pretend let her feel that she could forget everything.
“It would be nice to be a troubadour,” Kasia said, lying on her back with her eyes closed. “To go all over Polnya, and sing for the king.” Agnieszka’s hand reached out to grip hers. It was warm, a contrast to the crisp air.
“And you’d come home every Midwinter,” Agnieszka said, her voice trembling, “and sing us all the songs you’d learned.” Kasia’s eyes burned and she rolled to bring herself flush against Agnieszka so they could hold one another.
Tomorrow, the Dragon would come.
....
All her life, Kasia had been preparing for the moment the Dragon would take her. She had never been as close to her parents or siblings as she knew most people were. She had been kept apart from most of her peers. Every relationship had been marked or marred by the knowledge.
She remembered the first of October ceremony from ten years ago when the Dragon had arrived to take a girl. She had been convinced the Dragon would be just that, a fire breathing monster, despite her mother’s brusque assurances that he was a man.
It was that same man who appeared suddenly, looking as she remembered him, young but hard-eyed. Barely a moment had passed before the Dragon had already walked down the line of eleven Dragon-born girls, speaking only briefly to each.
And then he did the unthinkable. He took Agnieszka.