The Pearl Fox

Burning lillies

Labyrinthine and more impressive than Belldark, the city of Hillside Lake were filled with white, green, pink, ochre and blue streets. Terraced chalets of the suburbs were as found on different levels as the less affluent end. Each house had its own semi outdoor space, garden and balcony. The poorer dwellings were made of cheaper materials in darker colours, those houses were shaped like cubes with flat rain collecting rooftops. But even they had their own charm, and every dwelling has its own code and symbol as an address. Arasine sipped from one of the street corner drinking fountains. 

She'd left the infirmary after a while spent there by the doctors. They put her through courses of blood letting and the memory of pain was fresh still. When the male doctors in their scary raven black robes appeared in her room, she felt her heart palpitate and broke out in a sweat. These medical healers put burning hot glass cups on her body to stimulate a whirlwind of blood. They used knives to cut on her veins and draw out red fluid ribbons. Arasine was made to drink thick salves full of dead insects and garlic. And the worst that she had were the leeches placed on her. There were young women in lemon yellow gowns who wore veils, called nurses, that brought her proper food, wine, tea, and fresh bed clothes. 

She saw the library, the tall and slender Fire Tower, felt giddy looking at the high Green Rose Towers touching clouds from a distance. She explored the streets and their various routes, looked into a few shops, passing the city square, seeing a school, the few workshops and factories. She came to the Cavistan Gate on the west end of the city, crawling with guards, where men were repairing the gate from being badly damaged during the battle against Wild Hunters. Outside of the gate, were people throwing things into bonfires, but it was they adding more fire to dark decayed piles of mummified corpses and skeletons long dead. She went outside, and walked alongside the walls of the city, seeing the distant fields on one side, with woodlands and trees. More than a mile away from the city were the rice fields, domed shaped mounds with stripes of green and black. A few miles off from that were forests and then beyond were mountains.

Standing near one of the burning remains was an elderly Skylore priestess, garbed in a long yellow robe, and clutching some lilies that she flung on a pyre. She had brown eyes buried in folds of wrinkles, glaring across at Arasine. 

"You have a darkness in your soul," said the old priestess. "You've cursed the land. It's the blood, and not the words. You've been hurt, mostly by the heart and now we're all going to pay for it." The cold words stung. Arasine had felt pleased to see a Skylore priestess until she'd opened her mouth and gave dirt. It was betrayal all over again. The Grass House. The Zirch, Ebriaso, and B'dorico. The priests and priestesses by the Yellow Snake River, and the ones who tried to kill her at the Centre Shire Hall. 

"What are you talking about?" Arasine was annoyed, and it came across that way in her tone.

The old priestess just walked away, towards the Cavistan Gate entrance. Arasine kept walking, wiping stray tears from her eyes. 

She came upon the stone watch tower that was beside the city wall, and she just continued walking towards trees and dense flowering shrubs. Back into nature. It was here in this seclusion of thick dense trees and plants, called Triangle Green, that she came upon a pool of water, nicknamed Cloud Lagoon by the citizens of the city. It was a pond, and close to the edge of Silver Lake's upper west corner. A stone embankment and bypass was built on an isthmus between the pond and the lake, as the idea was to protect everyone using Cloud Lagoon from being disturbed by crocodiles. 

It was a calm and peaceful pond of such beauty that it took her mind off the bitter words from the priestess. Arasine removed her clothes and entered the pond. She swam around gently and loved how the water embraced her. 

There was a splash. She felt startled, but then seeing it was only a human being and not a crocodile, she burst out laughing. Joining her there in the water was a man in his late twenties with long blonde hair and full beard. His body was hard of muscles. He smiled at her and his eyes were warm and gorgeous like precious gems.

"Sorry I didn't see you here," he apologised, untruthfully. He'd known that she was there and had watched her strip naked. "I will leave if you feel like being alone."

"No," she said, grinning. "You can swim here as much as I can. It's beautiful and we should enjoy the water." 

"My name is Hanzak Elldrich," he told her. "I'm going to the awards ceremony by the Clock House tonight. Are you going to watch it?"

"You must be a soldier or a knight."

"I'm just a blacksmith but I helped defeat the Wild Hunters outside of the city."

She swam in circles, loving the water's warmth from the sun so much that she turned over and did a backstroke, forgetting that she was in male company. Hanzak felt himself harden and he attempted to look away but couldn't. 

"My name is Arasine, and yes I would love to go to the awards ceremony," she said and and flicked water at him as she laughed gently. Hanzak laughed, then splashed her with water just to see her breasts bouncing. The cool play excited them both, and soon, they stopped splashing around. Arasine and Hanzak held one another and they made heat where their naked bodies touched. Their mouths joined in a sweet kiss, and then both were out of the pond and embraced side by side on the grass. She folded her legs about his waist so that he could slide into her with ease. Beneath the trees, the lavender sky and golden sun, Hanzak and Arasine were joined together and reached bliss together, and both coupled again. When they'd finished, they got dressed and listened to the birds and animals. 

"Come and stay with me at the Headless Horse tavern," Hanzak said. "You're beautiful. Where are you from?"

"Jorno, originally."

"We're both southerners, and now we're here in the naval of Diaphry!"

She knew it was him from the WANTED posters a long while back. This was the same man who stole from the Blue Path shrine although Hanzak took bewitched objects but none of this mattered anymore. It didn't bother her that he robbed from the temple. She didn't care about all of that now.