Squire Hayseed

Choice

Barely a sliver of moonlight lanced through the slats along the wall. Hayley pried open her eyes and tipped her head back into the lush pillow. All around her were the ambient sounds of a mass of people hard at sleep. The snoring was inconsistent, darting from one bed to another, sometimes forming a melodic harmony. Her greater concern had been the Knight-Captain who was prowling up and down the alleys long after every other squire scrambled to bed. It'd be her luck that Erin was somehow so highly trained she didn't need more than an hour of sleep.

When the creak of the door caught Hayley's ears, she watched the knight's shiny heels clip out into the purple haze of the outside world. This was her perfect chance. Scrabbling quickly down the ladder, Hayley drew her hands limply in front of her chest while she tried to tiptoe around the sleeping heads. Most were hidden under blankets and pillows tossed over the eyes, but a few twisted themselves into haphazard knots.

Poor Marco was too tall for the bed, his head dangling off the end while his feet were propped up against the wall.

Not really the time to care, Hayley. Slinking through the barrack house, she twisted her body back and forth to match the creaking floorboards. No one was looking at her, doubtful any of them would be waking up. And even if they did, who would care? They all got what they wanted, losing a random squire none of them even noticed would be no skin off their nose.

If she was lucky, it wouldn't be until Gavin came to collect her in the morning that anyone would notice squire Hayley vanished into the ether. Her body froze at the thought, a shaft of golden light slicing down her eye. He could pick a new squire, a better one. Someone who was cut out for this shit, which would never ever be her.

The door rested but a hop, skip, and jump away, though Hayley resumed her tiptoe approach instead. She could all but lean over and reach for the handle, when a voice shattered the gentle susurruses of sleep.

"Hayseed, what are you doing?" the viper snarled, rising from her bed like a siren emerging from the misty moors before it bashed a few heads into rocks.

"It's Hay..." she shook her head. There was no point in telling Larissa her name, no point in answering her. Just go out the door and don't look back. Walk off into the moonlight and fade from their memories like the phantom you are.

Pinching into her nose, she turned to find the moonlight turned the redhead as white as snow. That prized hair of hers was braided and twisted on a shoulder that practically glowed against the dark of night. Eyeing up Larissa a moment, Hayley spat out, "Leaving."

She expected that to be that. What did Larissa care about Hayley's life? If anything, she should be ecstatic to not have the competition. Reaching for the door handle, Hayley tugged but an inch on the thing, her eyes darting to the hinges.

Larissa scoffed to herself, "I knew it."

That froze Hayley to the core. Her head whipped to the viper in girl form. "Knew what?"

"That you couldn't hack it. That you'd blanch at the first sign of a challenge, mewl into your milk, and flee out the door."

Hayley spun away from the exit, the hair along her neck raising high, "You don't know a damn thing about me!"

Blinking rapidly, Larissa extended a swanlike arm towards the door, "Weren't you just about to leave?"

"That's...it has nothing to do with... You're wrong!"

"Wrong that you are incompetent, untrained, incapable of following the slightest command, and that Ser Gavin must have taken incredible pity upon you to even bother? Like pulling a drowning kitten out of a river. You know the thing will be worthless, its brains scrambled from the trauma, but some foolish beat of your malnourished heart convinces you to keep it around. For a bit of a laugh, I suppose."