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Just Past Midnight

86th Harvest Aramane AOK 22 [/b] ‘Set her there,’ Garrett instructed the pair of guards who had carried the Princess through the streets and back to the Palace. Part way through the journey she had awoken, twisting and their grip with a cry of despair. They’d subdued her, securing her hands behind ...

Falling Leaves

10th Harvest AOK 22 [/b] ‘It doesn’t have to be this way,’ Emily watched her friend as she clutched the newborn to her chest. Elyna took a deep inhale of breath, taking in the sweet milky scent of her son. ‘You don’t have to do this.’ ‘I do,’ she replied. Voice so soft it was a whisper. ‘Otherwise ...

New Life

45th Bloom - Aramane [/b] Four riders approached the sandstone walls of the temple. Perched on the side of the valley, the walls seemed lit for display, glowing with soft golden light. The road was paved well enough, following the edge of a deep, crystalline lake only to wind its way to the gate ho...

Despair

Elyna knew that she shouldn’t hate Jared, but in that moment it was hard not to. They found exquisite bliss, moving together in unrivaled passion. There was nothing better than this, Elyna was convinced. Nothing better than kissing her lover as he moved within her. They were close, she knew it with ...

Despair

How had he approached without her notice? The stray thought crossed her mind before it was obliterated. Lost like dust to the wind, along with any other coherent thought. Her attention sharpened to the points where his hands moved against her robe, heat pooling in her middle. She could feel his brea...

Despair

Elyna moved over the man in a way that was painfully familiar. She smiled at him, cheeks flushed with desire as her knees settled either side of his hips. Was it wrong to feel so happy, giddy almost with his response, when so much in the world was all wrong? No, she silenced her own thoughts. Malcol...

Despair

Elyna had left her robe hanging over the chair with her skirts. In the pale blue under-dress she curled up beneath the cover, heart and limbs heavy with grief. It hurt to think she would never see Kyan again. That he and Malcolm would never know the best of each other, instead of the worst. She doze...

Despair

How was it possible to feel so euphoric and so devastated on the same day? Kyan had held her hand, fingers gently intertwined with his own darker digits. Her hand was no longer one she couldn’t recognise. The softness of seasons in Aramane returned to callouses that probably did not befit a queen. H...

Despair

Elyna listened and watched the truth in his actions. She reached out, resting her hand lightly on his arm, offering what comfort she could. She could see the longing in what the man expressed. He missed his home, his wife and family. She felt cruel for bringing him to Renmere. The truth was that she...

Despair

Elyna could only shake her head, without talking to Kyan she couldn’t know the cause of his attack. Her smile was wry when Malcolm admitted his faults. He was right, he shouldn’t have gone to fight Kyanite in retaliation. That Malcolm had been caught off guard, was entirely her fault too. He had tru...

Despair

Elyna was reluctant to part with her children, but the sound of their cries was making it harder to find any sense of calm for herself. ‘Ben,’ Elyna pulled on his sleeve as he settled first one baby then another in his arm ‘don’t let my father take them,’ she urged the man quietly. She met his gaze ...

Despair

Elyna returned Kyanite’s smile with her own. Her fingers threaded through Mal’s she looked to her husband for approval. Some sign that he recognised the greatness in a man who had grown so important to her. Looking back to Kyan, for the same the woman was confused by the expression on his features. ...

Despair

The woman was all too susceptible to his motions. Pushed against the wall, her hands curled against the stiff leather of his tabard and pulled him close. With his silent answer she was all too eager to return ardent desire. She tried to stay mindful of his injuries, but her hands were through his ha...

Despair

The argument was enough to churn her stomach. Elyna smoothed her thumbs along the underside of the table, feeling the small dips and contours in the wooden grain as it warmed beneath her touch. Her brows drew in a light frown, Malcolm had given her the opportunity to make her decision, but seemed de...

Despair

Elyna slid into her seat without fuss, acknowledging Malcolm with a nod. Why was it, that she always felt as though her throat was closing up? You’re a Skyrider, she reminder herself, act like one. She sat upright, as a soldier, a way that her body was used to holding. Her hands folded neatly in her...

Despair

It was a servant who found her, outside in the stables with a hasty smock thrown over her dress, and a scrap of cloth tied around her head like a bandanna to protect her haid from straw and horse dust. She had walked the perimeter of the keep, till her nose and cheeks were pink and her hands numb wi...

Despair

Elyna stood silently in the hall, unable to move. Unseeing the decorated floor beneath her feet. There was movement around her, she heard doors opening and closing in different parts of the keep. Echoing throughout the corridors. It was the greeting that caused her to stir. Looking up in surprise sh...

Despair

Elyna listened to his truth and realised that he had no understanding of how his words hurt. She should have held her tongue in Warrick rather than seek answers to her questions. Her hands fell, numb to her sides. ‘All I have ever wanted, Malcolm…is you.’ She paused, turning over his words in her mi...

Despair

Elyna remained perched on the table top, head bowed. She turned her face away from his shadow. His rejection like a slap to her features. ‘I’m not playing a game,’ she spoke softly, ‘I’m just trying to find a way forward… I feel lost Malcolm, and there is no map.’ He had listened to all of her vulne...

Despair

Elyna watched the man and his considered movements. The deftness of his hands as he sorted his books and turned papers away from her view. She bit her lip again, staring at the coloring of his face and the way he avoided her gaze. Was it possible he could be just as nervous as she? He was a king. Bu...

Despair

‘I said that I’d kill him if bloody Yvan escaped - again!’ Elyna was on her feet, her frustration making it impossible to stay sat. ‘I’m unhappy risking the lives of my children, because the pair of you are determined that bastard will stand trial.’ She turned away for a moment, determined to pull b...

Despair

It was though he sapped the strength from her limbs. Elyna moved forward, curling her hand around the back of a chair she pulled it back till she could sit, opposite him across the desk. Seated she pressed her face into her hands and forced herself to breathe again. Did he understand how infuriating...

Despair

Elyna shifted her weight between her feet, uncomfortable after standing for so long, yet he hadn’t offered her a seat. She was trying, desperately, to treat the man with the respect he deserved as her King. Yet her initial formality seemed to create indifference in him. ‘There wasn’t a great deal of...

Despair

Her mouth shifted into a rueful smile at his reply. Jared was head of skyrider’s when it came to it. If he felt she served better on the ground, then the ground was where she would remain. The woman’s chest lifted in a slow sigh, some of the tension easing from her shoulders. This was beyond her con...

Despair

Elyna nodded slowly, she agreed with what he said. She hadn’t intended to travel across Renmere either way, there had been too much death to risk any for such a reckless endeavor. Though as his answer settled, she realized that he hadn’t so much shared his thoughts as forbidden her to leave. Elyna l...

Despair

Receiving Malcolms reply, Elyna had returned to her room. Her nerves were undeniable and she couldn’t go to library armed with a sword or bow to help her feel confident. Instead she took the time to pin her hair neatly at the nape of her neck. The glossy auburn strands tamed to temporary perfection....

Despair

Her gaze narrowed as he mentioned the day with her father. She believed that he spoke the truth. So what had Pavoo requested? Why had he even dreamt that it would be appropriate to make demands upon Malcolm. The thought made her feel worse, sickness pooling with her dread. Elyna sank back down on th...

Despair

Jared countered with his rhetoric and the woman straightened from where she sat on the bed. It started as a tingle in her fingertips the sense of disconnection she felt from her own body. Light headed but weightless as she stood to face the Baron. A man over two heads taller than she and far broader...

Despair

Whatever Elyna had expected when Jared had entered the room, this wasn’t it. Her brows drew together with confusion. She opened her mouth to retort before steadying herself. She sank down on the edge of the bed, closing her eyes. Why had she married Malcolm? Her heart gave an uneasy flutter. It seem...

Despair

Elyna had managed to get Elsie back to sleep by the time she was back upstairs. She slid the girl gently into a basinet that had been kindly donated by a mother in the village of Mayce, whose own twins had recently grown out of it. She had lined it with Malcom’s wolf fur, in the silly idea that it m...

Despair

Elyna found herself moving back from the man, edging over the carpet without taking her eyes off of him. He said little, and she would be pushed to consider his tone as anything beyond irritation, but his fury was palpable. When had she become so afraid of anger? Perhaps the day she had borne twins ...

Despair

‘At the gate?’ Elyna’s surprise was enough to see the baby flinch in her arms. Back on her feet she rocked Elsie, gently patting her tiny behind. ‘At the gate?’ She repeated, lowering her voice, ‘thank the Seven you sent Emily,’ Elyna hardly dared believe in their good fortune. He must be right, eve...

Despair

With Malcolm staring so ardently at their daughter, Elyna carefully moved the baby so that he could see her. One of her arms escaped the wrap and fell limp from her side. Her head tipped back as she fell into deeper slumber, small lips pursed as she shifted. ‘She stirs in her sleep,’ Elyna explained...

Despair

Elyna had passed Elsie over with a smile, indulgent of her daughter. But she lingered, trying to keep her hands at her sides rather than fuss with the wrap or the way Malcolm held the baby. Malcolm had two older children, he knew how to do this and Elsie was safe in the arms of her Father. She took ...

Despair

Elyna had been sat on a chair, a book in her hands as she read quietly to the tribesman. Time had passed slowly within the walls of Mayce, but Elyna understood that books we rarer than gold in Emanys and had made a point to try and share the knowledge within them with the man. Instead of stories, sh...

Despair

Elyna looked up at Kyanite, watching him sign. He communicated with his whole self, face, body and soul aligned with the words he formed. She trusted him implicitly, in such a short space of time he stood beside Emily. A woman, who for so many years had been her only true friend and companion. Elyna...

Despair

Elyna shifted her weight, so that she could perch cross legged on the floorboards. She set her back to a dresser, smoothing her skirts around her ankles. The woman nodded, a universal answer to the Onkarl’s question. I am sorry for bringing you here . She signed eventually and forced herself to look...

Despair

Elyna looked up at the mention of a hunt, she held Elsie tight to her chest as Kyan cradled Luke. She exchanged a look with the man before offering her father a shy smile, ‘is there somewhere we can sit? I’d love to introduce you,’ she assured the man. But Pavoo was having none of it and reached for...

Despair

15 Bloom AOK 22 [/b] Ben and Emily made short work of the journey together. Even so, the Captain paused as the gates were opened for them, making sure that Pavoo and the rest of the troops from Burhan were making steady progress up the mountain in the precious hours of daylight. She hadn’t said muc...

The Return

Elyna had been sat beside Kyan in the dusk. She had no ability to manipulate the wild Esen in the lands, but could feel the cords of it as the tribesmen worked. It felt familiar, comforting to be tied to the earth in that way. She stood quietly as she was summoned and made her way to the horses. Smi...

The Return

Elyna had followed her Father without further protest, and without looking back. So this was it? Why had she returned to Renmere the woman wondered, what was it she had expected to find here? The gates of Warrick slid closed with a bang. A final note of dull despair that echoed across the desolate g...

The Return

Elyna was stunned by the revelation, she looked from Jared to Pavoo without understanding. Her Grandfather had conspired against Malcolm? Whatever color had returned to her features during her time in Emanys had fled in the cold morning, leaving her pale and wan. Her legs felt strange beneath her, a...

The Return

Elyna hadn’t managed to find sleep, in the brief half break of time before Emily tumbled into her room. She dressed silently, looking up to wave at Kyanite in greeting. Sure that the tribesman must find the whole situation as bizarre as she did. Her sense of dread crew with every passing second as s...

The Return

What was the point in explaining that coming across Yvan in the courtyard had been a step too far on an exhausting day. That she’d been overwhelmed with the fear of his escape, of the danger he posed to her family. That her gaze had narrowed and all the world had gone dark around her. She’d been as ...

The Return

Elyna tilted her head to the side, a smile started to form at the corners of her mouth as she thought to let Malcolm know he wouldn’t have to travel to Emanys to thank Kyanite. Though the gesture was just as quick to fade. Even after everything they’d been through, even though he was pleased she was...

The Return

It was too easy to curl up against the man. To rest her head against his shoulder and close her eyes. Whatever adrenaline had kept her awake so late into the night, was fading fast. It would be better to shut out the image of Malcolm and Ben and Jared rotting in cells beneath the palace. It would be...

The Return

His arms went around her and Elyna felt as though all the strings that had been keeping her, were cut. She buried herself against the man, one arms quick to fasten around his waist as she cried, trying to hide her features with her free hand. This was so embarrassing, but the woman didn’t know if sh...

The Return

His words fell heavily between them. The pulse in her neck flickered, as though suddenly awakened once more. Who was the man that had come to visit in the darkness? The King? A soldier? A man who wanted to hold his wife. Elyna found herself looking at the floor, the dark chasm between them. That was...

The Return

Jared’s reply was enough to see the woman pause in her steps. Elyna looked back over her shoulders, features tight with contempt. Her gaze only lifted to land on the man behind him. Malcolm was healing Yvan. Of course he was. She held her position, fingertips twitching to try again, hopefully killin...

The Return

Elyna reached back, secure in Kyan’s hold around her waist she curled her hand around his arm. Refusing to risk his loss, if she had to cling to the man then she wouldn’t let him go. The tribesman had become too dear to her. Varn collapsed at the walls and spent, she lent forward. Reluctant to leave...

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