Man O' War

Favorite

Daybreak. Mandatory sunning for at least an hour. Then lessons. First in private lecture with his siblings, then outside their home for the passersby of Miranx to see. Under Pa's instruction, of course. Then books. So many books. Books as far as the eye could see and pages turning. So many pages turning. In contest with a neighboring reader? Probably. And if it was midweek, a prayer to Kava, then to Ishva, lest one grow jealous of the other, followed by a meal. Large, usually uncarved. Maybe freshly slaughtered. Well, not maybe. Definitely. Then to bed. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

But now it was time for books and what a stack he'd gathered already! Many humble brown-black covers, some painted, some not, though all weathered, lay atop the table he'd selected in this silent hall. 'Silent'. Softly, so softly, the world vibrated around him. Bassy, concentrated mutterings of those close by, the gentle flip and scratch produced by parchment across tabletops, and the scritch-scritch-scritching of quill tips all tickled his stapes. A reminder that silence need not equate to lifelessness. And not just around him, but in his hands too. Between those humble covers, upon those delicate pages, but most of all, along the spines.

Broken, of course, at all the good parts. The sort of breakage that might nudge the pages from one's hand unwillingly. Rather less like patiently waiting objects and more like those tiny hatchlings who had no business other than vying for every morsel of attention they could garner. Smiles, tears, looks of shock, admiration, and other such things weighed as heavily to those thin sheets as they did to those littler-than-him babies.

Eiph'ck looked forward to joining the roster of the previously entertained as he approached a marked break in his current read. A growing excitement tickled his small thumbs, clamped over the pages read and those yet to be. Ah, books! His favorite!

"Hurry up! I'm bored!"

Well, second favorite. He peeked over his pages as Quye'ck melted into a dramatic puddle across the table. Unfortunate was the day favorites competed with one another. It was never a quiet struggle.

"Shh!" The sound came across as more of a hiss as he returned to his book and flipped to the next page, "I'm getting to the good part..."

"How do you know?"

"You can just tell."

The other boy groaned, falling into a more flattened heap still. Eiph'ck gasped as the spine gave, coaxing the book into a line. And more quickly than he'd deflated, Quye'ck shot up. His still growing comb saw the motion through, but only halfway, giving him the appearance of a delicate seedling whose leaves were still learning to find the sun.

"What?!"

"I was right." The serpent boy leaned back with a smile. "This is the good part!"

"Tell me!"

"No. You read it."

"I don't wanna!" He whined, thudding his tail against anything within its reach. He might have been swinging a hammer. It was hard to know one from the other. "You're better at books anyway!"

Eiph'ck frowned, lowering the volume from his snout. "You can't be 'better' at books."

"Yeah-huh."

"Nuh-uh."

"Yeah-" Quye'ck thumped his head on the table for emphasis, light at first. "Huh. Yeah-" Heavier, next. "Huh."

Eiph'ck snapped the book shut and slid it across the table at his friend. He trapped it with his head instead of making contact with the table and let out a displeased whimper as he sat up to nurse the offended area.

"What was that for?!"

"I guess I am better at books!" Eiph'ck declared with a squeaky giggle.