Barely enough

Prologue

A single dandelion.

Crushed.

The golden trim of his boots stepped on it as he made his way, through the abyss. The golden of his braid following close behind.

"500 years" the glimmer in his eyes were far gone, no longer full of life as they once were. The glow he once had nowhere to be seen, he trudged alone through the vast plains as the sun set to a doomed night. Sword clutched in his hand, lowly dragging behind himself.

"So what was your name again?" The inn was busy, patrons around every corner invested in conversation and food. The two were sat on the second floor, far from everyone else but not so to the point they were completely secluded. A sunset sat behind them, glistening off in the distance. His voice was calm, and deep. "Uh, aether" the blonde smiled, fiddling with a fork next to himself.

"Well, 'uh aether'. Would you like to be my travelling companion?" The older said, mocking the younger's timid response from earlier. He was rather tall, one would say just over 6ft but you could never be too sure. He wore a mask covering one eye, it travelled down into his shirt collar. Normally accompanied with a cape around his shoulders but that had been set aside, on his chair.

"Yes I.. Would like that" Aether smiled once more, "very much.."

"Dainsleif"

The sky was blue, mostly cloudy but you wouldn't say it was overcast. A girl, a girl stood beside him. She was short, he would say no more than 5'5 but then again you couldn't be too sure. Her hair was rather short, two long strands hung out from either side. Framing her young face, if you were to guess she couldn't have been anymore than 16 or 17 but that's just a guess. Who's to say this girl isn't 500 like she says. Besides her is a floating companion, he feels like he's seen this one before but can't put his finger on it. Maybe he'll ask later.

"Dainsleif?" she spoke again, bringing the older out of his thoughts. Right.

Straightening himself out, he stood from a crouched position. Leaving the crushed flower he was inspecting behind. "Say" he said as he stood, slowly walking back over to the girl. "Say your lost relative, witnessed the fall of rex lapis, or.." making his way past the shorter girl, towards the vast emptiness of land before them. "Or maybe he witnessed the destruction of the jade chamber, dvalins ending, or what is soon to be" turning himself around he picked a lone flower from the ground, "albedo's destruction" he chuckled to himself, a glint of a smile struck across the normally tame face. "but if that were to happen i would stand up to it" his face was as serious as ever as he left the flora go with the wind as a soft breeze passed the small group.

"What would you do then?" looking over to the traveller, her golden eyes immersed in thought. She looked troubled.

"What would i do?" hand carefully stroking his own chin as he thought, the noise from the guests below seemed to have died down as the night went on. The two immersed in conversation. The blonde leant back in his chair, arms crossed as he awaited the other's answer. "I'd defeat that darned dragon of course, sword and all" the other blonde laughed as he got up from his chair and flailed around the old silver sword he had.

"Careful now" Dainsleif chuckled, as the younger aimlessly pointed and swayed his sword towards imaginary enemies.

"Oh shut up" the blonde teased, insisting he continued his outright stupid performance of heroics. Whether there really were dragons and abyss mages in front of him or not. Dainslief was silent as he watched the young boy, blue eyes carefully tracking his eager movements, from the golden of his hair right down to the dirt on his boots.