“For everything,” she insisted dramatically, looking at him, pleading with him, to understand her heart and soul. But of course he was no mind reader and she was just a silly child. But as she sighed and looked down, noticed his broken body, she nudged him softly in the direction of a nearby spring. “Res won’t like it if I let you stay bloody,” she insisted, walking with him if he would walk and staying with him if he would rather stay. She would not force him- she just wanted to be with him.

But what was she really sorry for? She had to think, to grind the rusted gears of her dusty mind, to search deep into her very soul to find the words that she wanted. And when she finally said them, when they finally came out, the painted girl wanted to bury herself under a mountain of dirt and the shattered remains of her wall. Nothing would ever be so hard as admitting she was wrong. “I’m sorry for not taking my position seriously, for leaving you so many times while I ran off to have fun. You look so much more tired than I remember you before. And you deserve so much better than me.” She cut short as a sob broke past her lips, a gasp of air filling her lungs, and the emotional queen pressed against him again, softly so that he would not flinch away when she inevitably hit one of his many bruises.

“Kaj, I… I…” and she wanted to say it, she had to say it because he had to know, but gods what would he think of her? “Kaj, I killed Aurelia’s snake!” And before he could say anything, before he could answer or pass judgment, before he summon a storm and destroy her with his might, she hurried on, too many words jumbling together too fast, but she had to say them all before he banished her as well, because he at least needed to know the truth. “I didn’t mean it, it was an accident, it bit me and I kicked, and I wouldn’t have except that I wasn’t even thinking because Aurelia was running at me again, and it flew through the air and it hit the ground and I couldn’t do anything and Aurelia wouldn’t stop!” She gasped again, taking in air, filling her lungs since they had been emptied by her rambling.

And then she looked at the ground, because she could not dare to look at him. She could not dare to see the pain and hatred and loathing that she was sure would be in his eyes. She did not want to know the exact moment when their relationship turned from what it was to hate. She could not bear it. If her heart was shattered now, his disapproval would break her very soul. She did not know what feelings she had for him, did not understand them because she did not really have a word for them, but she knew that if he told her she was wrong, or bad, or evil that her very world would be destroyed. His opinion meant more to her than anyone else’s. He was her rock to steady her, her sail to guide her, her wall to lean upon when she was weary. If he would turn her away, who else would she go to? Who else would matter?

She had known this type of heartbreak once before when she lost her twin in the fire. And as she remembered how much she had hated everything for that year when she had wandered aimlessly, she knew that she would throw herself off the cliff when this was all done, once Kaj had finished condemning her, because she was weak and she could not bear to live with herself again, knowing that she had once again failed the ones she had loved. And then, in that terrible fear-filled moment, she knew exactly what the feeling was that she had for her king, her friend, her hero- Love.


@[Kaj]