It was late summer in the River Provinces.  The weather was that sticky, hot, muggy horrid weather than kept most people inside.  It meant that the farming village of Chelle was almost deserted in the middle of the afternoon, with its inhabitants almost universally taking shelter from the sweltering temperatures in the shade of their own homes.<br/><br/>Liliandra was a typical resident of the River Province, being dark tanned from hours spent out of doors, and rather athletically built, thanks to the toils in the fields.  Chelle itself was surrounded by farmland and countless acres of crops.  They'd all been growing extremely well this year, and when Harvest came, they'd be able to have enough of a surplus after the tithes to actually have a comfortable winter this year.<br/><br/>Liliandra normally kept to herself, having a couple of features that made conversation with others awkward.  The most striking of those features were her eyes.  One a startlingly deep blue in colour, and the other a pale almost pastel green.  It wasn't unheard of, particularly in The Realm, apparently, but it was enough to mark her out as Different.  And Different was avoided for the most part.  Their family had suffered through a few raids from the Wild Hunt as a result of her eyes, but even after extensive testing, it was pretty obvious Liliandra was not one of the hated Anathema.<br/><br/>Her other striking feature was her remarkable beauty.  Not princess or empress beauty, but certainly above the average for the region.  Her body was slender in the right places, proportioned well in others.  She was a perfectly formed, very simple looking young woman.  She never failed to accumulate suitors at the Harvest Festivals, although she had not as of yet selected one, always finding one reason or another to hold of yet one more year.  Rumour had it, now that she was old enough to own her own land, that she was destined to be like Old Maid Friesca.  Liliana knew better.  She wasn't going to give up on men completely.  She was just waiting for the perfect one.<br/><br/>All of that aside, Liliana was also a woman with a chore that absolutely had to get done.  And on the hottest day of the summer as well.  Stepping from the relatively less oven-like warmth of her home, she squinted her eyes at the blazing hot sun, glancing away quickly lest the orb burn her too much.  She lifted a hand to shade her face before hefting the large bucket her family needed filled, and starting off towards the irrigation stream.  She<em>should</em>have done this last night before bed, in the relatively cool evening, but she had put it off, having been lazy with yet another scorching day behind her.  She<em>should</em>have done this in the morning before the sun rose, but with no other chores to drag her out of bed, she had put it off, resting instead in the shade of her room in the basement.  Instead of the shoulds, she was doing it now.  Because the family would need the water for washing up and preparing dinner.  And it was her own fault for putting it off as long as she had.<br/><br/>With a small sigh, she headed off, wishing that this interminable heat would finally give way to harvest season, and the much much cooler days.  As it was, her slender frame was seating in droves by the time she'd reached the irrigation stream, and she paused there, setting the large wooden bucket aside, and kneeling by the stream's edge.  As always, she paused to look at her smooth face, smiling to herself in the water, before plunging her head entirely into the cool refreshing water, and holding it there as long as her breath held.<br/><br/>Pulling free with a loud gasp for air, and a shake of her long brown tresses, letting them spill the water over that thin peasant dress, and cling to the sides of her now relieved head, she knelt there in the dust of the road, and panted quietly for a few moments, enjoying the cooler evaporation.  Soon enough she'd have to refill that damnable bucket and haul it back to the house, but for now... she could rest here just a little bit.