For sff_corgi

[in_the_blue]

A long time ago, sff_corgi asked me for a drabble. Sometimes it takes me a while, but I always get them done.



Mari's Welsh Lesson

"Na. Iawn. Let me think it over. Wait, one moment..." Howl's voice lowered to a highly conspiratorial level; he looked round the room. Holding one finger to his lips, his head cocked to one side, he listened. "The coast is clear. See, Mari, your mam doesn't like me telling you these types of stories. She thinks I'm a bad influence."

"Silly Uncle Howell!" Mari squealed with joy.

"Shh!" His finger pressed against his lips. "We can't have mam listening in, yelling at me not to tell my favourite niece tales of valour, of soldiers and princesses and danger and handsome wizards and fearsome witches."

Mari nodded solemnly and quietly, climbing into her uncle's lap. "Okay. I'm ready. Make it as good a story as last time, please?"

"We say os gwelwch yn dda, Mari. Learn the language; it's a good one." His chiding was gentle, though: Howl was fiercely proud of Wales and of speaking Welsh, though this was the only place he used it any more. "Are we ready? Once upon a time, a dewin dewr -- brave wizard -- through no fault of his own -- found himself chased by a band of ruffians. No, really, it was no fault of his own. They didn't like him because he was smart and skilled and a great deal better-looking than the rest of them; they were simply cenfigennus -- that's jealous. Trust me when I tell you it had nothing to do with the dewin dewr (remember, that's 'brave wizard') chatting up their very pretty sister, right? No, he was dewr and telediw -- handsome -- and cyflym. Can you guess what that last word is? It means fast. He was faster than them, and a good thing too because they were calling for his pen, his head..."

The story wove on, and there was a milwr and a tywysoges and perygl and a dewin telediw and even a gwiddon brawychus, and both niece and uncle were so involved in the storytelling that neither noticed Howl's sister, Megan, leaning just inside the door. The inevitable scowl and chastisement melted to nothing on her lips as she simply watched, unable to interrupt.

For once.

Comments

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

It's HOWL! I love those books!

How much do you rock? Mightily, that's how much. :)

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

I must invite you, then, to come say hello to my other alter-alter-ego (http://wizard-howell.livejournal.com/profile) some day.

(Or did you think I stopped with Sirius?)

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

Oh, my gosh! You're Howl and Sirius!

I must not go over to Milliways... I know if I did I would want to read every single thread and I would get even less work done than I do now...

(it's very tempting, can you tell? :))

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

You can't read every single thread at Milliways. There aren't enough hours in the day. I know because I used to summarize over there. Talk about your thankless tasks...

And... *shifty look* ...I don't think you really want to see my list of character journals. I have... oh,tenofthem.

[sff-corgi.livejournal.com]

Eeeee, and it has the new bits too! Oh, hooray for Megan being human. :D

(You sent me chasing to the Lexicon, drat it. *grin*)

[afflau!]

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

Croeso! Croeso i ti, unless you want to be formal in which case I say croeso i chi.

Of course, that's all extrapolation. My command of Cymraeg is... dim gwerth rhech dafad, pardon my language. It's a beautiful language to swear in though, isn't it?

[sff-corgi.livejournal.com]

LOL, wouldn't know - I never remember enough properly to do so!

I've heard tell Arabic is excellent for cussing....

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

Now that I know. I can swear out loud in Arabic six ways to Sunday, but don't ask me to spell any of it.