PRESENT DAY
Archer
HIDDEN AMONG THE MOUNTAINS, the early rising Sun's soft amber glow had begun smearing the mountains, and the shadows of night had begun to scurry away.
The freshness of the wet dirt on the ground and the evergreen pine trees let loose their woodsy scent in the forest. The sounds of galloping horses and the rhythmic beating of their hooves contributed to sense of freedom and happiness within him.
A lock of blonde hair whipped him as Annalise turned back to her best friend Archer and grinned. She urged Electra and her majestic mare leapt up in the sky over the huge trunk of ebony tree that had fallen a few years ago.
In riding boots, leather pants and an orange t-shirt, a foreigner would never realize that she was a princess. Almost everyone in the town knew who she was. She would be skipping and hopping on the dirt ridden pavements covered in mud greeting everyone she met much to the disdain of her elder sister Olivia who was fondly called Vi or Vivi.
It was no surprise to Archer that her eyes would sparkle with devilish glint in them that hinted every mischief he tagged along with her, and by judging from her expression she was giving him, they would be striking another poor victim with their usual pranks. The boy would have given in to her, but with him training harder than ever to take his father's position as the next general of the army, it became nearly impossible for him to play pranks at the staff of the royal family and still expect to have a good reputation as a reliable and serious general; not that he was serious, but he was dependable and loyal with expert aim.
He raised one of his eyebrow questioningly and shook his head furiously when he realized what she was about to do. 'This girl was going to be the death of me,' he thought, groaning sadly as he tried to make her see his point which was as pointless as trying to make his little sister stop eating Aunt Mabel's cookies.
"This was not going to happen. Nope, not at all. You are not getting away with this" he stated firmly- or at least as assertively as he could with her. To him, she was a whole night of falling meteors that streak across the sky that are the brightest for the smallest trivial minutes that they outshine all the bodies in the celestial system, but then they shy away into the darkness of the night. They reminded him of her. She hated attention, but then she would have been the happiest to fade away in the background; she wasn't introverted. There was no shy bone in her body with her habit of talking back to people in the sweetest and the most polite way possible, only for them to realize the biting comment a few seconds later. She had the brightest of blue eyes that peered into his soul, and with a silent echo of his sorrows, she placed her hands in his to make him forget about it. He liked it: the comfortable silence and noisy banters with her.
She must have realized that he understood what her newest prank was because she stomped her foot childishly and he assumed that she was about to throw a tantrum, but instead she teased, "Oh come on. Why are you such a worrier? I am surprised that your hair are still black. Are you sure they are not fake," and with that, she ruffled his jet black hair like she did whenever she saw him despite his protests.
He rolled his eyes, and shook his head as they galloped along the way with the hooves of their horses in perfect synchronisation. He kept their horses at the same pace, knowing the moment he slipped into a daydream her wild, wavy hair- that were usually unkempt at this point of the day due to the whipping breezes in that part of the forest- would smother his face as she laughed on his misery with him soon joining in for no reason. Their pranking expeditions led to their horses always being stocked up with their pranking supplies and Aunt Mabel's cookies that they had stolen from Archer's sister's cookie jar that she guarded when she was awake; fortunately, this was one of their secrets to keep, and certainly not their last judging by their adventurous preteen selves, or as he preferred as preteen and a teen, clearly not happy about him being demoted to a category that he was no longer part for almost two years at the age of thirteen years and ten months. Annalise - or Belle as he'd liked to call her- was on the eve of her twelfth birthday, which Archer promised would be the last one till he could surprise her with the biggest party to celebrate her teen years.
YOU ARE READING
Ashes of Revival
Fantasy"The war is coming, so is Mordlum. Let's Play... " Six years is enough to change people- their hopes, their dreams, their goals. Time is a privilege most people have yet taken for granted. After having lost his parents, his house and his best frien...
