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"You're getting shaggy again," Iris laughs. He reaches a hand over and ruffles Maya's hair, messing it up more than it already is. "You're really gonna need a haircut when you get back."
She shrugs his hand off and sticks her tongue out at him, "You're the one that cut it like this in the first place!"
"You asked for it! Don't get mad at me 'cuz you kept wiggling!"
They're sixteen and nineteen, and Maya's about to head out for her three-week trip into the mountains. She already knows she wants to be a paladin like dad, but she's going anyway in case she's really meant to be something else; a healer, maybe, or a mortician. She might even be meant to be a magician, but that's something Polina is more interested in than her.
"I'll sit still this time, I swear." She laughs.
Iris grins at her and yanks her into a hug, "You better! And don't get sap in it while you're out there or I'll cut it all off and then you'll really be dad's mini-me."
"Noo!" Maya fake whines, but they both know she wants to be just like dad. The hair thing doesn't matter much to her, but Iris says it's important. He says his old mom taught him all about it, so she trusts him to be right.
"Yeah!"
They bicker back and forth for a little longer because Iris can talk for hours and Maya might be scared of talking to people, but he's her brother so she's contractually obligated to bug him back, or something like that.
Polina pokes her head out of the house when mom and dad walk over, and she quickly makes a beeline for Maya. She has a big book in her hands, nearly the size of her torso, and she holds it out to Maya.
"Take this with you," She says, "It's not a magic one so you can borrow it. You have to give it back when you get back, though."
Maya untangles herself from Iris and holds the book oh so carefully. Polina has always been very particular about her books and their conditions. Never is a page bent and never is a drink spilled on them. She's always got her nose in one tome or another, dead set on becoming the village's youngest wizard. This isn't a tome though- and it's really three smaller books taken apart and delicately sewn back together at the spines and rebound to make one bigger book. It's Polina's top three bedtime stories.
Maya holds it like it's made of glass and then gently tucks it into her backpack. "I'll be very careful with it."
Polina shoves a pinky toward her, because she's very smart, but she is still fourteen, "Swear on it."
Maya hooks her pinky with her little sister's, "I swear on every word in it that I'll be very careful with your book."
"And?"
"And that I won't bend any pages."
Polina stares at her for a second, trying to decide if Maya is telling the truth or not. She seems to find what she's looking for and nods once before letting go of her hand.
"I'll make sure Iris doesn't eat any more dirt while you're gone."
Iris squawks, "I didn't eat it!"
"You did!" Polina and Maya say at the same time.
"Mom, they're bullying me!" Iris whines.
Morgan and Devon Kirst stand a few feet away, both in varying stages of trying not to laugh. Devon is doing okay, covering their mouth with their hand, but they can't fake cough the right way and it sounds more like they're choking on something quietly. Morgan makes it about five more seconds before she laughs out loud.
"Mom!"
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry kiddo," Mom wheezes, "This is very serious!"
Polina grins, "Very, very serious. Eating dirt isn't good for you, you know. It gets all clogged up in your throat and comes out your nose."
"Does not!" Iris looks back down at her.
"How would you know?" She looks innocently back up at him.
"I think he still eats dirt." Maya whispers loudly.
"Dad!"
"Okay, okay," Dad composes themself, "dirt eating aside-"
"I don't eat dirt!"
" Dirt eating aside , Maya has to go before it gets dark. Come on, everyone say goodbye," Dad clinks and clanks as they walk closer to hug Maya.
"You stay safe out there, okay?" They say.
"I will, promise." Maya hugs them back, even if their armor makes it awkward.
"Good, good." Dad takes a step back and is almost immediately replaced by Mom throwing their arms around her.
"You remember the way?" She asks.
"Yep! Just look for the tallest peak and go south from there." Maya nods.
"And back?"
"North." She says and they squeeze one last hug around her before stepping back.
Iris and Polina both hug her at the same time and it nearly knocks her over. Iris messes with her hair again.
"Don't forget to keep yourself clean," He says.
"Infection is deadly," Polina adds, "So be especially sure to wash any scratches. Actually, don't get scratched at all."
"What she said."
"I'll be safe and clean," Maya hugs them as tight as she can. "Don't make trouble. Remember to talk to people, Polly."
"You're a hypocrite." Iris says.
Maya snorts and the three of them break the hug. "Fine, I'll work on it if you do."
"Deal." Polina agrees.
There are a few more goodbyes that are really just stalling, and then Maya starts walking. She trudges through shallow snow until she can't see the village anymore and she decides that somewhere in the next three weeks, she's going to find something really good to become.
Maya Kirst is twenty years old (and a few months, give or take) and shifting on her feet in the snow.
She's not in the same spot as she was four years prior. She's actually on the complete other side of the village, closer to the downward slope than the upward one. She's not heading into the mountains this time, but rather out of them. She's never left this range, and she's terrified.
Iris isn't there to make jokes about how long her hair has gotten, and Polina's book still weighs heavy in her bag. Mom and dad aren't standing strong and tall behind her and making sure she knows the way. They're all behind her, but they aren't there .
She turns around and looks at where the village once sat. She knows people call it the Grave Village because of their god, because of their large cemetery, but she looks at it now and thinks it looks like a grave of its own now. It isn't flattened by any means, but only a few buildings are still standing, and she's had to expand the cemetery on her own.
It winds into the streets, and in some cases into homes where she couldn't get some people fully out and had to settle for stakes in their yards. She wonders if this means she's the last one to know its real name, never to be spoken.
She doesn't really want an answer to that question, the question of if anyone made it, if anyone is out there still. She knows she has to find out though. She has to know.
She has to know, if not for herself then for the ones that definitely didn't make it, because they deserve to know. She has to know, because she needs to know what happened , if anyone can tell her.
She needs to know if their destruction was on purpose or not. She's been praying like it was an accident, like it was their time, predestined and written down for thousands of years in the hands of a god, but she knows if it was on purpose she'll have four more years of praying to do, just to make sure they all did make it. Kelemvor would take them in with open arms, but the prayers for their travels are different, and she'll have to redo them.
She tucks her hair out of her face and checks her bag one more time. She doesn't know when she'll be back, so she stares for just long enough to memorize every path she can see, and then she turns around.
She wants to say she didn't look back, but that's a lie. This time when she leaves, Maya stares the entire time. She walks backward until she can't anymore and she pretends that her dad's sword clanking against borrowed armor at her side is the sound of them walking with her.
She counts the steps until she can't count any higher, and she starts over again.