A "slice of life" scene I'd written for Marwa a long time ago, inspired by what had been a (back then) throwaway line of dialogue during RP. :) Cleaning it up and posting it here.
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Marwa, thirteen and reedy, sits sullenly under a stunted ishmarila as a distant storm begins to move in from the horizon. She can see small vessels slowly heading back to shore below her, their pale sails not even the size of the nail on her thumb when held out at arm's length. Most of them seem to have stayed cautiously nearer to land this day, perhaps with their captains having felt the winds and smelled the air and seen the color of the sunrise... or something like that, anyway. But a scant number of them had gone a more daring distance out, appearing from her viewpoint as unbothered and still on the surface of the water. She spends a while taking measure of the shadow creeping in behind them.
Then she hears Adnan approach from a distance, treading lightly down the rocky path toward her. She could tell it was him, for Madiha would not come down here, Basim would have come with another pair of footsteps, and Safwan was not only heavier in his stride but also currently irate back at home, or so she had heard before she fled here.
"You, sister, are a menace," Adnan says gleefully when he nears, not bothering to hide his grin.
Marwa looks over to him to shoot him her best glower - an expression she had come to practice and implement many a time, carefully crafted in mirrors to be impressive to the unwary target. (...Were they of her age, perhaps, and also not a close blood relative.) After a few moments, she simply scuffs her shoes firmly back up the slanted boulder's face so that she can better wrap her arms around her knees, and stares frowningly out toward the brewing storm like some aggrieved, overly dramatic poet.
Her brother brushes off some leaves and chips of rock where a divot in the boulder makes for a natural if not very comfortable seat. "I mean it. You've really done it now," he continues as he settles down below her. "Did you know he'd already placed wagers with our cousins?"
"He deserved it." When no answer comes, she makes sure to add rather righteously, "Besides, it's unbecoming to bet."
Still no answer. Sullenly, once the silence stretches for longer than is tolerable for her, she finally mutters, "It's not like I clipped every one of his birds."
"No," he agrees. "Just his best."
"It wasn't even very much."
"Enough that she won't be any good in a wager."
"They'll grow back."
"Not in time, they won't," he scoffs.
She smiles a little in spite of her complicated mood, and turns her face away so that her brother might not see it.
They sit together for some time longer, peering off at the expanse of water and the approaching clouds. He talks occasionally, breaking up the silences which had gone from being typically contentious to, in the last year or so, curiously peaceable. She still wasn't sure how this had changed. Adnan wonders if he might have a winning chance this time, now that the eldest sibling was effectively out of the running.
He leaves as the day grows increasingly dark. Marwa sits alone once more while the breeze stiffens and begins to play with her hair. As she spies the last couple of fishing boats hurrying to shore, looking as if they are tugging the darkness in behind them, the first tiny drops of rain begin to flick down from the sky. They hit her nose and cheeks and the backs of her hands, heavy and portentous.
With a sigh she unfurls herself and skids down the side of the boulder to land on the ground. She dusts off her thawb and, after a moment’s thought, pulls off her headscarf before beginning to head back up along the cliffside path, making sure to bundle the embroidered silk securely under an arm and shield it from the oncoming rain. No use in getting scolded for drenching Umm Jareer’s gift, in addition to whatever was waiting for her back home.
She would, some years later, come to reflect on the cruelty she had inflicted on that blameless creature of Annur, when she had more time than she'd ever found herself wanting to think upon all the things behind her and ahead of her.