Venn Diagram

Prompt from Ilayra: She was an orc raised by elves and believes herself to be as soft and delicate as her two sisters, Lily and Hibiscus … this is the story of Peaches, the cleric. POV: Third person, limited.

I
There it was again. She winced, because she wished it wasn’t there. But it was. That stutter-step, as if her feet were asking her “Are you sure you want to go there?”

Yes. Yes, she did. She straightened up, set her face, and walked purposefully through the very large oak doors, into the atrium. She did not break stride, because she had learned to will herself not to, and marched towards the security sensors, valid pass in hand held towards him, refusing to make eye contact.

“I need to see your pass,” he said in his usual monotone. As if he didn’t say it to her every damned day!

“It’s right here, Turnip,” she said, thrusting it under his nose, then had to cough, to make it sound like she’d called him by his real name, Turpin. But even “Turnip” was too good for him. She rightly called him “Turd-pin,” but only in her head. She was, after all, brought up with the culture and manners of elves.

Turpin took the pass and held it up to the light to check for security features, making sure it wasn’t a fake. Like he did every damned day. Meanwhile, her three other least favorite persons in the world, Pitaya, Cherimoya, and Kiwano, waltzed right past the security desk, without even pretending to flash their passes, and through the sensors. Like they did every damned day. They always took it in turns to throw her a condescending sneer as they went by. Today, it was Kiwano’s turn.

“Pity,” Peaches thought, without meaning to, “she was a cute baby.” But the days of playing with Kiwano and the other little dwarf babies when they came to visit were well gone. Nowadays, everyone pretended to not remember her childhood, her innocence, her impeccable manners, the hours they had spend together while their mothers gossiped. They had done art and archery, and made up plays to act out for their indulgent parents. Nowadays, these three, and all the other dwarves, half-dwarves, half-pretty-much-anything, really, and even most of the wood elves looked at her and saw only one thing: an orc.

Turpin, disappointed that he could find no fault, handed back her pass with a derisive snort. Every damned day. “Any sharp weapons?” he asked, as he did (I’m sure you’ve guessed this) every damned day.

“No,” Peaches sighed, and proceeded to walk through the sensors, quite safely, as she did… well, you know.

The really ridiculous part of this whole daily charade was that the sensors had been designed by the city’s finest spell-casters. They had been double-spelled to filter out both non-clerics and sharp weapons. It was simply not necessary for anyone entering the Cleric Library to do anything except walk through the sensors. The first spell would stop any non-cleric. As clerics could not carry sharp weapons, the second filtering spell was a completely redundant security feature, but the Bureau of Spell-Casters designed redundancies into their security systems, wary of hackers. Did Turnip really think Peaches was some high level hacker? No, he was just another hater.

II
Peaches was demoralized just getting into the library, where she had every right to be, and needed to be. Exams were next month, and she had two assignments due by the end of next week. By the end of the year, if all went well, she would earn yet another level. Despite the sneers, cold shoulders, and sometimes open hostility, Peaches had excelled as a cleric. She was a full level and a half ahead of her starting classmates, and she had caught up with Pitaya, who was older than her.

After dropping her satchel at her usual corner desk, she went to the stacks to find the textbooks she needed. She stared, surprised, at the gaping hole on the shelf. There were supposed to be two dozen copies of “Heal Thyself” available, but there were none. It didn’t take her long to unravel the mystery, and the undisguised sniggering helped. Turning, Peaches saw that the dwarf sisters had all twenty-four copies of the book on their desk. Determined to keep things civil, she pointed and asked “Are you using all of those?”

“Yes, we are,” was the predictable reply.

“Ok, very funny,” she said lightly and tried to pretend she was in on the joke, happy to be the butt of it, “but I need just one to finish my essay,” and after a pause she added “please.”

“Sure, you can have one,” said Cherimoya, “but could you give me a hand with this science problem, first?” She was all sweetness and light, and Peaches knew it was a trap, but what choice did she have? She needed that book.

Peaches stepped over to the desk and looked at what Cherimoya was working on. It looked like a Venn diagram. “So for homework, we have to draw a Venn diagram with very little overlap. Can you think of two categories that have some overlap, but very little?” Cherimoya asked.

Peaches remembered this exercise from when she’d been at that level, which seemed a very long time ago. Most of the class had chosen things like “cats and dogs,” but Peaches had reasoned that these had a lot more points of overlap than her fellow students had shown on their diagrams. She had chosen earthworms and bricks, after two hours of brainstorming and research. She was genuinely scanning her memory for an equally ingenious pair to offer, when Cherimoya said “Oh, it’s ok, I’ve got it!” and she drew two large circles with a sliver of almond-shaped overlap. Over the left circle she wrote “Clerics” and over the right, “Orcs”.

Peaches knew she was in grave danger, but she couldn’t get her feet to move her away.

In the sliver, the intersection, the list of things these broad categories were supposed to share, Cherimoya wrote “eat, sleep, poop,” and put her pencil down, task done, as her sisters roared with laughter.

The librarian looked at them sternly over her pince-nez glasses, but said nothing.

It was the final straw. Peaches ran to get her satchel and tried to bolt from the library. But she had to run past the dwarves. Cherimoya stood up, blocking her just long enough to shove the piece of paper down Peaches’ shirt, saying “Hey, don’t forget this!” Peaches grabbed for it like it was a burning ember, and shook it to the floor.

“No littering,” said the librarian.

“Fine!” Peaches hollered at her, surprising everyone. She scooped up the paper, thrust it in her bag, and finally got the hell out of there.

III

She didn’t call out “Hello,” like she usually did. She didn’t go check what was in the fridge, like she usually did. She didn’t instinctively find her mother, wherever her mother was, without consciously trying, like she usually did.

Instead, Peaches flew up the stairs, slammed her bedroom door, hurled her satchel at the wall. She stood, but only for a moment, heaving with rage. Then she threw herself at everything her eyes lighted on, and either tore it apart or smashed it against the wall. She howled with all the rage she had pushed down for all these years. Her pillows had stood no chance, of course, but the desk gave her at least seven minutes of blissful resistance. She pounded it with her fists, yanked it apart at its joints, and it stood in for all the dwarves, half-dwarfs, half-everything and even a few wood elves who had ever hurt her.

The room a mess, but her anger yet present, when she saw the lamp. She pitched it with all her strength into the corner of the room, and it dutifully shattered into a million pieces.

That did it. “Oh…god…no!” Peaches came to herself, too late. That lamp had been a present from her aunt, her mother’s sister, given to her on the day of her adoption. It had been set up in her room by her new elven parents, who had promised her that, like the lamp, they would always light her way. She had watched her father read stories to her by the light of that lamp. She had devoured books herself by that lamplight, as she grew. She had played somewhat roughly with her sisters over the years, pillow fights on the bed, but always, always, careful of the lamp.

And now it lay, not just broken, but destroyed, on the floor, as a few feathers from the pillows wafted down to settle beside it.

There was a light knock at the door, and without waiting for an answer, her mother came in. She wordlessly sat on the bed next to her eldest daughter. Iris held her child’s much larger hand. Eventually, she said only two words: “Thank you.”

“What?” Peaches asked, completely confused.

“I never liked that lamp,” her mother replied, and laughed, “I mean, cerulean is so last century, right?” She looked around, taking in the destruction. “Oh good, we’ve been wanting to redecorate, haven’t we?” and she smiled.

Before Peaches could react to this unexpected response, there came a sing-song, playfully mocking voice from the doorway “Ooooh, someone’s having a hissy fit!” She turned to see Lily grinning at her. Hibiscus was also there, a little more hesitant, perhaps, but also smiling with love.

In response to their queries, she showed them the diagram that Cherimoya had drawn. They stopped smiling. Hibiscus said “When I’ve finished my general studies, I’m going to be a cleric.” Hibiscus, a cleric? The girl was incapable of staying inside for an hour at a time unless she was sleeping, and she even preferred to do that outside. No, Hibiscus was going to be one of the best rangers in the realm, but Peaches knew what she meant. She meant “I’ll do whatever it takes, make whatever sacrifice is required, to protect you.” Peaches sniffled.

“Oh goodness, no,” Iris said dramatically, “spare us from that! Hibiscus, as a healer, you’d poison us all!” She took the piece of paper from Peaches, and looked at it. “You know,” she said, “clearly they’ve forgotten to put compassion, intelligence, selflessness and about a hundred other things in here,” she said as she tapped on the almond-shaped intersection. “But there’s something more important about this.” Peaches looked at her, expectantly. “My dear, they assumed that this,” she indicated the overlap, was where you live. But you live here,” she said, drawing her finger in a big circle around the entire diagram. “This,” she tapped the almond, “is just your bridge.”

Iris handed the paper to Lily, with a nod. Lily snapped her fingers and applied the flame that appeared to the paper. With a small circular motion she created a tiny whirlwind that took the ashes out the window. “There, that’s gone,” Iris said with finality.

“Is it time, do you think?” asked a deep voice. Gerald, the girls’ father, had appeared, holding a highly polished ebony box.

“Yes,” said Iris, “I do believe it is.”

Gerald gave the box to Peaches. “What is it?” she asked.

“A gift from your birth parents,” her father replied. “They left it to you in their wills.”

“What is it?” Peaches repeated.

“Open it!” the other four cried.

Inside, lying in its own groove surrounded by red silk was a dagger. Peaches took it out. It was glorious! It hummed in her hand and she knew they belonged together.

“Oooh, ooh, you have to give it a name!” said Hibiscus, jumping up and down and clapping her hands in excitement.

“Pillow Slayer,” suggested Lily, throwing a handful of feathers at Peaches.

“Lamp Unlighter,” said Hibiscus, pointing to the shards in the corner.

“Very funny,” laughed Peaches, “but there’s really only one name my dagger could ever have.”

IV

Peaches didn’t go back to the Cleric Library the next day, or the two after that. Instead, she stayed at home with her family, playing at archery, hand painting, and dressing up. She and Lily jumped out at Hibiscus when she wasn’t looking, scaring her into screaming, and piling on top of her in delight. She and Hibiscus put baking powder on the top of the sugar bowl, and laughed until they cried when Lily put some in her tea, which exploded like a volcano. And Hibiscus and Lily stuffed wads of newspaper in the toes of Peaches’ shoes, and howled when she couldn’t get them on but couldn’t work out why.

On the fourth morning, Peaches purposefully packed her satchel and went back to her studies. She did not stutter-step. She did not avoid Turpin’s eyes. No, she looked right into them, holding up her pass, but refusing to break stride. He saw something that made him come awake and he failed to ask her to hand over her pass.

“Any sharp weapons?” he managed to get out, although with bit of a quaver, just as Peaches reached the security sensors.

“Yes,” she replied, still not faltering, “I have a dagger.”

“But you can’t..” Turpin trailed off, as she stepped straight through. He turned to see the dwarf sisters stop next to his desk, open-mouthed.

No alarms went off. Nothing so much as blipped. It took only a second for Pitaya to call out “Liar!”

Peaches stopped, but she didn’t turn around. Instead, she reached under her cloak with her left hand and drew out Cream. Holding the blade at shoulder height, she twirled it effortlessly around her fingers for a bit until she caught it in her fist, blade pointing upwards, in a very obvious, very large, very defiant middle finger salute.

“The sensor must be broken!” said Cherimoya, “Give me that letter opener!” she demanded of Turpin. When he didn’t move, she snatched it up, anyway, and walked into the sensor.

ZAP! There was a loud yelp of pain, followed by the acrid smell of sauté’d dwarf.

Peaches turned slowly, an amused smile on her face, to see the other two dwarves and Turpin tending to Cherimoya, who looked like a cartoon character, her eyebrows gone and her still smoking hair standing on end. Pitaya was staring at her sister. Kiwano started to cry. But Turpin was looking up at Peaches with wonder in his eyes. Not quite respect, yet, but that would come over the ensuing months and years as her brilliant career blossomed.

“How’d you do that?” he asked, with just enough of a hint of awe that Peaches realized she would never again have to stop and show him her pass. With that knowledge, all animosity left her.

“Easy,” Peaches said with a slight shrug, “I’m an Orc Cleric.”