Leta's family were presumably killed during a Rebellion, and she was whisked away by one of her father's most trusted guardsmen to a faraway island to live out her days in exile, as ordered by the new King Calas. After King Calas's death, the Lady L...
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She was exhausted. She'd taken watch last night and, of course, received little rest. She was running on barely any water. Death was a welcome relief right this moment, sweet relief, but she continued through the field.
The sky was grand, though. She looked up and gazed into the Eternal Blue Sky. It's morning. Some of the sky was pink, some the softest blue. One small cloud scuttled along. It's strange how everything below can be such death and chaos and pain while above the sky is sweet blue gentleness.
"So," Tristan started. "How shall we pass the time?" Leta sighed. Tristan glanced back at her, but she's swatting away a fly and misses the look he gives her. "There's a knife game I could teach you."
"Does it involve the potential for losing fingers?" Leta asked.
"Not if you win."
Leta and Cedric: "No!"
"Okay, a drinking game."
"Oh!" Cedric exclaimed. "Unfortunately, we lack a necessary element of the game."
"Do we?" Tristan pulled a flask out of his pack, giving it a provocative shake.
"You've had that this entire time?" Cedric glared.
"Emergency only," he shrugged. "So, the rules: I make a statement about your past. If I'm right,you drink. If I'm wrong, I drink. And no lying."
"I don't think I want to play this game, either," Leta shook her head.
"Ced, you first."
"Oh, merciful God."
"You are valued for being wise."
Cedric laughed. "I am the wisest person I know, dear Tristan." Tristan passed the flask to Cedric and the old man takes a swig. "Okay," Tristan sighed, continued: "You dragged us on this little adventure because you're bored and in need of friends. Come on, drink. Rules." But Cedric does not drink, and the flask is passed back to Tristan. Tristan gives one last statement: "You were a terror as a child."
"At the time," he said, almost wistfully, "I believed I wasn't a bad child. Probably average, or a little better behaved than average. In retrospect, however, I was completely insufferable."
The flask is passed to Leta. "Princess." He addressed her facetiously and she looked away. Tristan is quiet for several moments, glancing over his shoulder every now and then as they walk up a hill. "You've been hurt before, many times before, but you've always found your way back from pain. I think born a wolf. You're a powerful and relentless creature. We just don't know it yet." Leta studied Tristan, weighing his his words carefully.
It was Leta's hope that the rest of the world would stand still while she got herself together again, but Chaos and Tragedy continued to march into other lives close to her own as well.
