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"WILL YOU NOT SPAR WITH ME, MY FRIEND?"
Kaipo looked up from where he was seated on one of the walls of his kingdom, a book splayed across his lap. He smiled as he caught sight of Alasdair, head of the guard and his own personal protector, sworn in ever since they were young. His smile was sad and apologetic, and Alasdair's own hopeful one melted into a mirror image.
"You know I can't, my friend," Kaipo said, closing the tome and tucking it under one arm, moving to walk with the man along the streets, glancing towards the wall which, if he had fallen, would have landed him down onto another, most likely crushing a citizen passing by.
"You won't be fighting," Alasdair tried, sounding all of the younger man that Kaipo had known him to be, with the same boyish excitement that never truly left him, "You will be aiding me in my endeavors to stay sharp and alert in the event of a crisis."
Kaipo laughed, shaking his head and continuing to walk, brushing past him. "Using the word 'endeavor' does not automatically make your argument any less paper thin that it already is."
Alasdair groaned then, a sound so immature and adolescent that the prince had to make sure it had come from him. "Training with the troops is out of the question, I have to be a leader with them, it's not as..." he trailed off, searching for the right word.
"Fun?" Kaipo supplied, unable to hide his massive grin. Alasdair nodded, almost pouting, and the larger man threw an arm over his shoulder, laughing heartily. "You were always looking for trouble, my friend."
"Not trouble," the other man argued, "Fun. Something, anything. Doesn't have to be a battle."
Kaipo's eyes darkened at that. "Battle is never fun, my friend. War is never something to wish for."
"I know," the guard replied, nodding, "I am aware of this, but there is little else that gets the blood pumping in such a way."
The prince motioned towards a group of men and women that passed, nodding in respect towards the prince and the head of the royal guard. He gave his friend a sly grin as they all passed, "I'm sure you can come up with something."
"You," Alasdair said, hiding his smile and punctuating his words with a sharp jab in the chest, "Are a filthy animal."
Kaipo laughed as the head of the guard turned a bright red, ducking his head as some members of the group turned back to look at him, some casting kind smiles that affected the leader greatly. For all he was stone cold and calculated in battle, he was less than strategic in affairs outside of the battlefield, a realm Kaipo secretly wished he would depart from.
But it was not his place to force his most trusted friend out of the realm that he had been forced into. For Alasdair was not an Asterion, but a Kallrynion, a people that had long since been captured and forced under the rule of Kaipo's people. At least they had, many millennia ago, but that was a history neither were a part of, neither were their fathers nor their fathers. It was during the time even before the conquest of Odin, an event they were narrowly spared from, but had, after some time, been able to morph itself into a treaty of understanding and mutual respect.
