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“What’s your name?” “Serene.” “Serena?” Elliot asked. “Serene,” said Serene. “My full name is Serene-Heart-in-the-Chaos-of-Battle.” Elliot’s mouth fell open. “That is badass.”
“She was the first thing I saw when I walked into a room,” he said at last. “And once I saw her, I never wanted to look anywhere else. She would speak, and whatever she said was brilliant and startling. She was like that, a constant bright surprise. She was always talking, always laughing, always dancing, and she was never what I expected. I was even surprised when she left.”
“I am Serene-Heart-in-the-Chaos-of-Battle. Keep a civil tongue in your head or lose it.”
“It makes perfect sense. Of course the children bear their mother’s name. The woman is the strong one, who bears the child and begins the family. You can’t be sure who any child’s father is.”
“Oh good, you’re here,” she said to Elliot. “You can administer manly sympathies and sweet comfort.”
“I was worried that you would be fretting, Luke,” Serene continued. “I know how boys do.”
“I am mystified by everyone’s behaviour!” Serene exclaimed. “My breasts are not so large as to need supporting garments, so why should I wear anything on my upper half? Don’t worry,” she added. “I’m not self-conscious about the size of my bosom at this time. I am still very young, and I will develop further. Besides which, I do not subscribe to the superstition that says the larger a woman’s breasts, the greater her courage on the battlefield and prowess in the bedchamber.”
“Breasts are functional. They feed children. Whereas I know many men cultivate their shoulder and abdominal muscles merely to attract the opposite sex. Their chests are the ones that are more decorative and which it is less modest to display!”
“The way,” Serene said, after a pause, her voice fierce so it would not shake, “they looked at me. As if my skin were sin, and theirs never could be, and I should have known.”
Fourteen wasn’t horrible, but it was more complicated, and sometimes that felt like the same thing.
“Oh my God, your whole life just flashed before my eyes. Blond annoying smugness, weapons, weapons, annoying smugness, little kiddy weapons, right back until you were a fat smug baby. Oh my God.”
“Oh dear, a child,” said Serene, moving backward with more alacrity than elven grace. “Could someone fetch a man to see to it?”
“The woman goes through the physically taxing and bloody experience of childbirth. A woman’s experience of blood and pain is, naturally, what makes womenkind particularly suited for the battlefield. Whereas men are the softer sex, squeamish about blood in the main. I know it’s the same for human men, Luke was extremely disinclined to discuss my first experience of a woman’s menses.”
Serene patted him on the back. “Perfectly all right, I should have had more respect for your delicate masculine sensibilities.”
“What, you people expect women to tear apart their bodies and then go to all the bother of raising the children? That takes years, you know,” Serene remarked sternly. “The women’s labour is brief and agonizing, and the man’s is long and arduous. This seems only just. What on earth are men contributing to their children’s lives in the human world? Why would any human woman agree to have a child?”
They left pillows arranged in the shape of bodies under their sheets, which was fairly basic subterfuge, but the captains didn’t check the younger ones’ beds as carefully as they did the older ones’, on account of indecency and lewd behaviour. “I would have thought the girls of the camp would be more careful not to dishonor the boys,” said Serene when Elliot explained this, deeply shocked. “The boys are already fighters, which cannot be pleasing to prospective wives, and if they are ruined on top of it, who will marry them?”
“Well, elvish women are driven by powerful lusts that men cannot understand,” Serene said in matter-of-fact tones.
“Once a woman’s passion is roused it can be very difficult for her to stop until the act of love is completed,” said Serene. “Preferably several times over. How can an innocent man understand such desires? As I understand it, men are completely exhausted when they complete the act of love once.”
“After the first flush of youth,” Serene said sadly, “men are only able to perform the act once a night.”
“Thus, necessarily, a man must perform attentions upon a woman when he is no longer aroused, which is why for a man such acts are more about feelings of the heart than of other areas,” said Serene. “Else how can a woman be satisfied with just one man?
“Come now. It’s natural for a young pure gentleman to be abashed by such discussions,” said Serene. “Forgive me for being so frank with you and putting you to the blush, Luke.”
“I suppose we were a bit rough with you. Lot on our minds, you know? Womanly things. I’m sorry about that, little gentleman.”
“Don’t you worry your pretty head about a thing,” she said consolingly. “The women are here to take care of you.
At one point Elliot forgot himself and told Swift that she was an idiot with no grasp of politics, but Swift rumpled his hair and told him he was a little spitfire.
“I get it now, Serene. He’s a taking little thing, in an odd way. Grows on you.” “That was maybe my first ever compliment from a lady,” Elliot said. “Thank you for making it absolutely awful. Oh my God.”
Swift had placed him protectively at her side because she said that some of the younger elves hadn’t seen a boy in weeks and their hands might wander.
“There are also simply some women, warriors and not, who can never be tempted by the shining hair and alluring chests of men,” said Serene. “Sure,” said Elliot. “Guys too. I mean, by women.” Serene frowned. “Are you sure?” “Yeah, a guidance counselor gave me a ton of pamphlets over this guy called Simon,” said Elliot. “I’ll show you some.” “It just seems so unlikely, given that men cannot truly feel the pulse of desi—”
“The pretty blond one may dress like a harlot, but I think he is truly a modest gentleman,” remarked Silent, whose name Elliot thought was ironic. “Look at his sweet blushes.”
“She was a devil with the gentlemen. Ruined two gentlemen in the west woods. I heard one of them was married off to a goblin! Of course Sure is settled now. The love of a good man will steady you one day too, you firebrand. Running off and joining the Border camp, of all the mad things to do! Your mother was raving about it for days. But proud too, you could see it. Of course she’d have the wildest daughter in the woods. All the careful fathers had best seal their virtuous sons in the nearest tree!”
“I wish I could grow a moustache like that,” Elliot said wistfully. “Probably a bad idea,” said Luke. “You can’t control the hair you’ve got.” “Besides,” said Serene, joining them, “I know it’s natural and everything, but don’t you think it looks weird if a man has hair anywhere but on his head? I mean, can they not be bothered to put in the time and effort to look good?”
“Wow, it’s been a while, hello old friend being hit in the face,” Elliot said, putting his tongue out and tasting the blood, feeling the split and swell of his lip gingerly. “Yep, turns out I still hate pain and think violence is pointless. Sorry, I think I was attempting emotional catharsis, but this is dumb and you people are stupid.”
This magic land was all wrong. In the books, you had to destroy an evil piece of jewelry or defeat an evil-though-sexy witch or wizard.
“I’ve decided to put an end to all war,” Elliot announced. Rachel blinked. “That might take a while.” “I know. I probably won’t be done by the time we’re out of school,” said Elliot. “That’s why I figured I should get started right away.”
Elliot glanced down at his Pink Floyd T-shirt and jeans. “I am wearing totally normal clothes. Plus my T-shirt is cool and retro.” “Luke’s right, it is a little provocative,” said Serene. “Not that I wish to question or shame you. You should wear whatever clothing you feel most comfortable in. Being comfortable in yourself is the best way to be attractive to others.” “Firstly: thank you, you’re as wise as you are totally gorgeous. Secondly: I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: I will not be lectured on my fashion choices by a pair of fetish-gear enthusiasts.”
“I don’t suppose anyone was insensitive about it later?” he asked hopefully. Luke shrugged, the last of the tension going out of his shoulders. Serene looked relieved. Elliot knew that she lived in the constant fear that one of them was going to go off into hysterics.
“I can’t plot vengeance against myself, you must see that,” said Elliot. “But I can plot something else! I love plots, you know that.”
“I will stop yelling at you if you let me support you,”
“If you wish to tell me, I will be happy to hear your secret,” said Serene. “I vow not to mock at you and never to tell anyone the object of your tender maidenly affections, not even if they torture me. A true gentleman’s heart is as sacred as a temple, and as easily crushed as a flower.”
“Don’t worry, children, the women will protect us!” shouted Bright-Eyes-Gladden-the-Hearts-of-Women.
“I suppose you think that just because I am unmarried and in employment I am no better than a hussy peddling pornographic literature!” “What?” Elliot said. “No. What?” “I’ll have you know, I am dedicated to my passion for the written word,” Bright raged. “And one day, my true elven knight will come, and she will understand my love of literature and why I felt called to promote said love among human children. Moreover, I will come pure to my marriage bed, as all true gentlemen should aspire to do!”
“I can read Luke like a book,” Elliot told him evasively. “And I read books extremely well. Speaking of which, do you have any instructive pornographic literature?”
“I’m only trying to help.” “Well, your helping is terrible,” said Luke. “Everything you do is terrible.” “Fine,” said Elliot. “I have more terrible work to do. Please leave.”
“Do you two have selfless and nurturing natures? I mean, hypothetically: Kids, yes or no?” “Women have so many other things on their minds,” said Serene. “I’ll decide when I’m older.”
“Don’t be a silly little thing,” said Bright-Eyes. “Men don’t abduct people. Just boyish high spirits! You should both channel them into embroidery.”
“I was saddened to hear Serene had launched a successful attack on the citadel of your virtue,” Swift said. She sounded genuinely grieved. Elliot was grieved to be having this discussion. “The citadel was totally into surrendering. Also I personally would not have referred to it as a citadel,” Elliot observed. “Like, ever.”
“No doubt you tempted her. Ah, a man’s morals are frail as they are, sweet silly creatures,” Swift said. “I do think it was up to Serene to control herself, though. She must have known I was considering you as a bride. Your humanity would not have mattered so very much, up in the wild north where I am stationed, but now you have been sullied, of course it is out of the question.”
“How fascinating, please go on,” Elliot encouraged Dale gently, and stabbed himself in the arm with a butter knife. “Whoops, butter fingers. Butter knife . . . fingers.”
school is not a very special hell, as people haven’t yet learned to hide how awful they are.”
“I don’t have a special table,” Elliot protested. “Uh, you, the murderous, man-hating elf girl, and the intense gay kid?” asked the medic. “You’re the weirdo table.”
