The Vixen Trials

The Best Kind Of Friend

"You'll try to be a brother to him, won't you?"

Keilah

"You said you wanted to come to my room?" Dakkoul asked when they had left her relatives behind.

"I did." Despite everything, she was curious to see where he lived.

"That'd be better for Malek, although not so good for sword fighting."

"Malek? I thought he was a spy that you don't like," she said as she glanced backwards.
Jalen seemed to be almost carrying a puffy faced Malek. Alyssia hovered beside him.

"What's wrong Keilah?" Dakkoul asked softly.

She looked away. They went to his room in silence. It was small and dreary, brightened only by a child's scribbled picture nailed to the wall. Jalen helped Malek stagger through an internal door into another room.

Keilah ordered Alyssia to go and get her sword, then sat down on the only chair. "Why'd you tell me to shut up?"

A corner of Dakkoul's mouth rose. "I'm glad you remembered our signal. Your grandmother would certainly have forbidden any village rites. They insult the way of the Fox. Is that really what you're cross about?"

He was too perceptive, always. Keilah stared at her fingernail. She'd got Alyssia to trim them and dip them in perfume. What could she say? You didn't dance with me? You chose other women over me? How pathetic would that sound? Hadn't she made it clear she would choose the Prince over him?

"It doesn't matter," she said.

Alyssia returned puffing and holding her mother's old sword. Keilah put it on the wooden floor and knelt before it. Dakkoul knelt beside her. She refused to look at him.

Alyssia spoke in place of the village priest. "We now remember Lady Melisane."

"We remember her," Keilah and Dakkoul said.

"I remember," Keilah began, "how she taught me to fight with this sword. I didn't want to but she insisted every lady needed to be able to defend herself."

"I remember." Dakkoul's voice was low. His eyes were on her. He added, "She let me join in and taught me too."

"I remember," Keilah said and unbidden the memory came of her and a much younger Dakkoul laughing and fighting and her mother making the training both fun and serious.

On and on they went swapping reminiscences until Dakkoul went quiet.

"Your turn," she prompted, glancing at him. His lips were pressed together and his eyes seemed shiny.

"I've only got one left," he muttered. Of course he had far fewer memories than she did.

"Go on," she prompted.

"I remember," Dakkoul said hoarsely, "the night a baby slipped too early through my mother's legs for the third time."

Keilah shivered. She remembered too.

"My mother screamed and screamed and my father was away. She wouldn't listen to me. I ran to your mother and she told me to stay with you. I was with you for four nights and when I returned my mother seemed back to her usual self." He cleared his throat. "After that, I always felt your home was my home too."

"I remember. It was."

"I don't have any more memories, but I want to say this. Since coming here, I admire your mother so much more. She left a life of power and luxury because she believed it was wrong. She chose to live in poverty with your father despite the opposition of your family, despite losing everything her childhood taught her to value. It was an honor to have known her."