Avline Charm's Story

Avaline
We watched from the alleyway as hundreds of adults passed us. Probably going to one of Bragon’s meetings, I figured. “Avaline, come one.” My brothers hushed voice startled me. He had already slipped out of the thin alleyway and was quietly walking down the cracked pavement. I scurried after him, trying to make as least noise as possible. I wasn’t too good at it, at least not as good as Evan. Finally I caught up to him and bent my head downwards so I could only see our feet. Then I pulled my hood up. We didn’t want to attract attention. That was hard, however, due to our blonde hair that glittered under any light, artificial or not.
We stopped in the market place where there weren’t many people. Few vendors were even open. The ones that were had been left to older children, about my age. It was a perfect day to look for food. As we passed, Evan slipped his hand out every so often, taking a piece of food for ourselves. When we got to the bakery my mouth was watering and my stomach was growling. My hand hovered over a pastry. “Hey you, orphan! Come here!” I froze. A boy with shaggy blonde hair raced past me. My fear melted. It wasn’t me, nor my brother they were after. Besides we kept a low profile, so they weren’t likely to know we were orphans. My hand relaxed and grabbed the pastry…just as a plump, middle aged woman came out of the store. “Now I’m late for the meeting because I couldn’t find my keys! What a-“ Her muttering cut off as she saw me with the snack halfway into my mouth. “Thief! Thief!” She shrieked so loud it hurt my ears. I stuffed the pastry into my mouth and ran, following after the boy the guards had been chasing. He probably had some sort of hiding place, unlike Evan and I. A glance back told me Evan was right on my heels and the guards on his. Biting down I ran even faster. As we raced a vanilla cream filled my mouth.
Yum, I thought, my favorite kind.

Evan
The cries rang out in the air and Avaline raced past me. As soon as I saw her running, I ran too. The boy we were following looked back and came to an abrupt stop. Not expecting this, I continued to race past him as he yelled directions to the supposedly safe place. We kept running with all are might. Surprisingly Avaline is much faster than me, in short distances that is. As soon as we had run up to the first corner she stopped and started panting heavily. I, however, was not at all out of breath. “Just…need a…minute.” She gasped in between breaths. I glanced back at the boy who was facing the two guards alone. Avaline was slowly getting up. She would be ready to start running again in a moment. I had made up my mind.
I gave my sister a light push forward. “Remember three rights, a left, and over the wall. I’ll catch up.” She blinked and from the expression in her eyes, I could tell she was afraid to separate from me. “I’ll be fine.” I told her with, what I hoped was, a reassuring smile. “Now go.” My voice got a bit sterner. “Oui!” she said in French. I don’t think she realized she was speaking in a different language. I watched her disappear around the bend before turning around and searching my dirty jeans for a weapon. All I could find was a pocket knife with multiple uses. None of the choices included anything I needed right now, say a battle axe, or a spear. Actually, I’m not that strong; just quick. A light sword would fit me better, but at the time I unfortunately did not have that luxury.
I flipped out the closest thing I could find to a weapon, pulled my hood down low, and ran back to the mini battle. Just as I got there the boy tumbled into the canal with a piece of rusted railing and one of the guards. The other turned to face me. I gulped and glanced back at the water. Hopefully the boy would swim to shore. I was confident that the soldier would sink to the bottom with his heavy armor. But heavy armor or not, the guy in front of me looked pretty powerful. And so the fight began. I dodged ever attack he made, but I wasn’t quick enough to perform a dodge and hit. We continued on with this game of strike and miss until finally I punched him on his chest plate. All I got was a hurt hand. He, on the contrary, got an opening. His fist slammed into my jaw and I slid across the pavement. My useless pocket knife slid out of my hand under his foot, which he brought down. Hard. I jumped up as the huge man brought his spear and hit my back. I remember a salty rusty liquid in my mouth. I remember falling into the canal. I remember the cold water engulfing me and the boy in the water who stared back at me. Then there was black.

Rowan stood, silently watching the scene unfold infront of her - She knew that Idax (She managed to recognize him, even soaked and bloody.) could handle it but still felt the urge to help anyway she could.
And so she followed them swiftly back to the Orphanage, her bare feet immune to the sharp pebbles which clawed at her feet, now.
She enjoyed being bare foot, either that or wearing her combat boots but any other shoes and she finds them too frail; they don't seem to want to stay on her feet.

As Rowan entered the door in which the boy must be, she noticed also a girl there too.
Taking a deep breath, Rowan hid the tears that formed behind her eyes when she thought about siblings for even she had, had one once, in fact she had three - But they were all dead now.

Shaking her head out of this sadness, Rowan puts on her usual neutral face and walks into the room, looking at the boys' wounds.
It seemed like Idax had a few more and yet the other boys was deeper.
"Would you like me to help?" She asked them all, although Idax should know she wouldn't take anything other than 'yes' as an answer.
Walking to her bedroom, she reached under her mattress and brought out a small bottle of anti-septic.
Rowan then went to the bathroom, getting some tissue to dab it onto.
As she walked back to where Idax and the siblings were stationed she smiled at them, remembering she hadn't even introduced herself yet.
"Hello," She says, "I'm Rowan."
After the greeting, she puts a small amount of anti-septic tissue on both boys' wounds, attempting to preserve the bottle just in case she has another fight with a guard.
After cleaning the wounds - In which a lot of pain was had - Rowan wound tissue around each wound, using tissue as a poor excuse of a bandage.

Avaline
I took a piece of bread from the boy realizing I still didn’t know his name. I wanted to ask but I wasn’t sure how. A sound caught my attention. The two figures I had seen in the distance earlier had now arrived. The boy had bumped into the older girl. He blinked for a moment than catching sight of Evan and I said, “Hey, I’m Boris!” He proceeded to rush over for his share of bread. The girl stood silent for a moment then informed us that she was Ryann. “Bonjour,” I replied in French “I’m Avaline.” I scooted over to the younger boy, Boris. I was interested. I had never met anyone of my age and my curiosity was bothering me. I wanted to smile and start up a conversation with him but I couldn’t. I just stared.
Meanwhile Evan was emptying his pockets out and introducing himself at the same time. There was mostly bread and a few dry pastries. My mouth watered but I didn’t dare take one. We had to save our food. A girl walked in snapping me out of my daydream. She looked very young, maybe 10 or 11. She was pretty short too, like me. Yet I was still a bit smaller maybe by an inch. For a second I smiled realizing that for once I wasn’t the youngest. Then I remembered I was around people. My face flushed and then returned to its blank state. “Hello.” The girl greeted us. “Hey,” My brother answered. He looked perfectly relaxed. I, however, was very flustered in this new place. There was one new person flooding in after the next. Sighing, I forgot to answer the girl.
“Bonjour, je suis Avaline. Enchanté de faire votre connaissance.” I said. It was French for “Hello I’m Avaline. Nice to meet you.” I doubted the girl could speak French but I said it anyway. Shows how tired I was.