The old general store didn’t get many visitors.
The once popular area had seen a steady decline over the past few decades. As more and more businesses headed deeper into the forest, nearer the capital, those who lingered on the outer edges fought to remain afloat.
This was the exact position Ava’s General Store found itself.
Frequently, the oldest of the two boys that worked the shop, Rowan, would ask the owner, his adopted mother Ava, why they didn’t just shutter the old place. He and his brother were plenty old enough to provide for themselves, in a bigger city. She could retire to one of their homes and live out her days without worrying over her struggling business. He could meet a girl, get a real job, and start a life to match.
She always assured him that while he very well could do this, it would be a solo venture.
“I’m must stay,” she’d tell him simply. “For now.”
For now.
He learned to hate that phrase.
She used it frequently.
For now.
When he and his brother first found themselves, at all of eight and six, begging for food in the market of a nearby town, Ava had been quick to lead them along, back to her wagon and then her general store.
“You can stay with me,” she’d promised that day and held true to it since. “For now.”
It was indefinite.
The term.
For now.
With Ava, it seemed to just mean forever.
A softer way of putting things, maybe.
Well over a decade had come to pass since he and his brother first came to stay (work) on the woman’s property and though it wasn’t all pleasant, he couldn’t say he could complain much. The general store needed to be swept daily and manned, but other than the regulars you could time down to the hour, not many visitors came strolling through. So unless you had a delivery of supplies to go into town and get, you just kinda had to linger about all day, awaiting nothing.
That’s what he thought of it.
The long wait for absolutely nothing.
An old inn was attached to the back of the general store and though Ava made them periodically dust all five rooms it contained, the most use the building ever got was when they were little boys and would play hide-in-seek within its halls. Before, you know, he lied to his younger brother that it was haunted, just for kicks.
Even now his brother wouldn’t go near the building.
Which meant that Rowan was stuck doing any and all dusting that Ava required of it, all these years out.
Fitting punishment…
Other than cleaning and keeping shop though, there was little else to do out in the forest. When they were younger, adventures were all the rage, but now two men on the cusp of their twenties, running over the same, tired ground had grown stale.
Sometimes it felt like they were just waiting for death.
In fact, he was pretty certain Ava was.
She’d been something of an important figure during the Great Wars.
Now she was a lowly shopkeeper.
Rowan didn’t envy where she found herself, but fuck, just to have a few of her memories for a day…
It was the sound of a carriage, horse hooves thudding, large wheels rattling, that caught Rowan’s attention that day. He was in the inn, doing that once a month dusting Ava required. He was up on the second floor, running a rag over the windowsill when, through it, he could see a rather expensive looking carriage pull onto the property. From his vantage point above, he couldn’t quite make out the driver, but the man wasn’t anyone he knew.
Rather, from the silver plated armor he wore and the insignia that was engraved upon it, Rowan could tell he was a part of the royal guard.
The guard jumped down, being sure to grab his helmet from the bench beside him on the way. His entire body was covered either by armor or chain mail, save his face, which while Rowan couldn’t quite make out his expression from such a distance, showcased a stubbly beard over his cool brown skin. After slipping the helmet over his head, the guard rushed to the door of the carriage, holding a hand out to help the first of two cloaked figures down. Each took his hand in their slender own, the cloaks and hoods they wore fluttered about as they leapt down from the carriage, but not enough to reveal anything more about them.
A third, uncloaked man was the last out. The guard didn’t offer his hand and the man didn’t seem to expect it, merely jumping down and looking about. He was Galian, Rowan was nearly certain, a combination of noting the decided point his ears came to and his similar complexion to the guard. He was talking to the others, or at least his mouth was moving, as he ran a hand through his coarse, tangled long black hair and began walking towards the store.
Up in the inn, Rowan’s brain began to melt.
Finn was alone in the general store.
Finn was alone in the general store.
Rowan, of course, had no way of knowing exactly who’d just rolled onto their property, but he knew who was about to be required to help them and, well…
His younger brother was a bit of a fuck up.
Massively.
Atop his klutzy behavior and immaturity, Finn also boasted an inability to shut the fuck up.
In any scenario.
He was a natural showman who, unfortunately, just lacked the charm. His smile was warm though and earnest, down in the general store, when he welcomed all four visitors. The store wasn’t very big, just two shelves lined with things and a larger back area, where Finn could pull anything not out on the floor. There wasn’t really much all to look at other than the eighteen year old boy behind the counter.
“Hi!” A bright smile lit up the teen’s features as he waved, unable to contain his glee. His olive, sun tanned skin had a red tint as he greeted, “Welcome to Ava’s General Store and Weaponry Depot. Plus inn. And dojo.”
Through the window down there, he too had seen the carriage arrive and the visitors step out. Though he didn’t immediately key in on the royal insignia that lay not only over the guard’s armor, but also the very cloaks the women wore, he seemed pleased just to have customers.
The women hung back some, by the door while their guard stood by. Finn was still all smiles as, slowly, the other man approached the counter.
“Good afternoon,” he greeted with a bow of his head. “We were just hoping to stop in for some supplies. My friends and I are journeying quite far and need much. We’ve also been stuck in our carriage for a few days with no place to stop off. Please, if there is a bathhouse or-”
“Of course!” Finn couldn’t let the man go on uninterrupted for much longer. Bouncing on his feet in his excitement, he said, “You can stay in our inn! This is going to be great!”
“W-Well,” the man was quick to say, glancing uncomfortably back at his associates. “We’re not really looking to stay, you see, just a quick washing up and then we’ll be out of your-”
“But it’s already so late in the day,” Finn argued. “And dinner is included! Err, well, our dinner’s almost done, anyways, probably, and it’s just stew, I think, so you can all have a bowl. And you can just give me that list of yours, huh? And I’ll get your carriage all filled up and ready to go for the for the morning.”
“While that is a very kind offer,” the man tried again, “we really should be on our way-”
“Where are you headed?” Finn wasn’t going to let this chance at a conversation with someone who wasn’t his older brother or mother slip through his fingers. Leaning forwards on the counter, he smiled warmly at the man. “I could give you directions.”
“It’s really not necessary.” The man in front of him was clearly growing annoyed. “Can you please just allow us to use the bathhouse? I’ll pay as if we stayed the full night, of course, if that’s the problem.”
“Awh, it’s no problem at all,” Finn assured him as his face fell a bit. “If you’re sure, I mean. Just thought we could all have some fun here, s’all.”
Looking past the man (now that he was peeved, he wasn’t so much fun to converse with), Finn waved again at the other three. One of the women had her back to him, but the other didn’t and, even though it was shadowed, he caught her gaze. Blue eyes peered nervously back at him as she raised a hand slightly to offer one in return.
“Balt, would you stop fucking playing with him?”
It was the woman that had her back to Finn though that said this.
She’d turned suddenly on her heel, hood falling back from her head some as she closed the short space between herself and the counter. Long, silvery white hair flowed freely down now, passed her shoulders, framing her round face. The pudge in her cheeks stood stark against her otherwise athletic build. The scowl etched into her golden light brown flesh was deep and, honestly, a little scary.
Finn could’ve sworn he felt the air in the room shift and become a bit stiffer as she spoke.
Her gaze intense, a new pair of blue eyes found the man’s, clashing heavily as the woman insisted, “We need to rent a room for a few hours. We won’t be staying for dinner. During that time, I need you to fill up our carriage with the list of items my friend here, Balt, gives you. You’re going to do this silently. My guard, Radic, will pay you twice the worth of the items in royal coin. You will never speak of this moment again. Understood?”
Finn only stood there for a moment, staring curiously at the woman’s face for a moment, before remarking, “I’ve seen you somewhere before.”
“Damn it, Toren,” Balt griped. “Why did you have to come over here? I was handling it.”
“Damn it me?” The woman scoffed and her hood fully fell from her head now, revealing her fully. “Damn it you! If you were handling it, Balt, I wouldn’t have-”
“Would the two of you,” came a growl from the front of the store where now, the guard was coming to break them apart, “stop using your real names? We already went over this!”
“Um, Radic?” Pushing her hood back as well, the last woman over by the door had a darker complexion than the other, but their matching white locks and deep blue irises gave away their connection. Softly, she called out to the guard, “Maybe you just should’ve not said it was their real names? Or-”
“Thank you, Lia,” Toren cut the other woman off. “This is ultimately all Radic’s fault, isn’t it?”
As both men took to frowning at Toren then, Finn only grinned over them all.
“Are you sure you guys can’t stay for dinner?” he asked with a snicker. They were already the most fun he’d had in awhile. “’cause-”
“Finn, what are you doing in here?”
Suddenly, the general store doors were thrown open once more, one nearly hitting poor Lia as she stood beside. It was Rowan, olive face flush as he’d only imagined all of the things his brother could possibly be fucking up. He’d rushed right down from the inn and panted a bit. While Finn grinned sheepishly over at him, Rowan merely glanced between the people amassed in the tiny shop. Subconsciously, he ran a hand through his short, layered brown hair while, across the store, his brother shook his similarly shaded, yet far longer and shaggier, hair literally in the faces of the customers.
Rowan almost died.
He’d known they would been important before he walked through the door, but face to face now, with the women’s hoods down, he felt like was going to pass out.
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“What do you mean?” his brother carped back at him as Rowan stared with wide eyes at Toren. “I’m helping the customers!”
He’d expected nobility, Rowan had. Some sort of dignitary stopping in at the last general store before the Wasteland. Instead, he found himself staring into the glaring eyes of Princess Toren Aither with what he imagined to be her royal guard flanking her. A glance to his side would show that he’d just accidentally hit Princess Lia Aither with a door.
His heart was beating out of his chest.
Time felt like it had slowed and he was searching Toren’s face then, turning his gaze back to her just to see if he could spot it, if it existed. A faint flicker of recognition. After all these years.
But she gave none.
“We need to get out of here.” The guard noted the transfixed look on Rowan’s face. Taking a step closer to Toren, he grabbed her arm and began to walk her towards the door. “Princess-”
“Princess?” Finn questioned as Toren only shoved the guard off. “You don’t mean… Hey, are you guys-”
“I… I apologize, Princess!” Rowan yelled this, giving up on Toren recognizing him as he turned instead to look at Lia. “For striking you, with the door. I-”
“You hit her with the door?” his brother quipped with a snicker as, leaving Toren behind then, the guard came instead over to Lia. Rowan blushed as the man took a step between himself and the young woman.
“N-No, I… I mean, if I did, I’m sorry,” Rowan huffed. “But-”
“I,” Toren spoke up then, turning once more to face the counter and, by default, Finn, “need a room. Now.”
“O-Of course, Princess!” Rowan turned from the guard and Lia to look back over at Toren. Heading towards the counter, he assured, “Right away. Just let me get a key-”
“Toren, I don’t think we should stay here.” Balt glanced between the two brothers. “We really should just-”
“I am not,” she insisted as she turned her glare onto him, “getting back in that carriage until I’ve had a chance to bathe. If they already know who we are, what difference does it make?”
“Not to be rude or anything,” Finn intervened as, with Rowan there now to figure out where the stupid inn room keys were (they had the skeleton key, for themselves, but since no one ever used the inn, neither had any idea where Ava kept those), “but how come we weren’t supposed to know you were the princess, huh? I wouldda probably charged you for the rooms, had I not known.”
“Finn!” Rowan wanted to slam his head into the ground. He would be slamming Finn’s head into the ground. The very second their company left. “You’re speaking your princess. Stop-”
“I am not his princess. Nor yours either.” And Toren was the one eyeing them then as Rowan, bent down beneath the counter, searching the shelving there for a key, felt a cold sweat spread across his forehead as this was it, finally.
She was going to recognize him.
Or at least he thought.
Then, with no recognition in her tone, she declared quite plainly, “You’re not Galian.”
It was very evident by their feature. Galians were the specific race of elves that inhabited Kroto Forest. Though neither princess was Galian, they were what made up the majority of their vassals. Galians were denoted by their dark, course hair, specific twirl of their ears, light brown skin, and general ruggedness. They served under the Odon, the race of Toren and Lia’s father, King Torcan, and had for centuries.
They made up the majority of the Forest’s population.
The men before her, Toren knew with certainty, were not under her dominion. At least not by birth.
“No,” Finn agreed easily as Rowan was having a bit of a freak out it seemed, down on the ground, frantically tossing things in a fruitless attempt to find a key, the key, any key, anything, it didn’t matter anymore. “We’re not.”
“And you’re not Availian either,” she kept up, eyeing him closer now as Finn only beamed. “Or Harkai.”
“We’re not elves.” Finn even shoved up his hair some, proudly showing off to the woman his rounded ears. “No points.”
“We’re not from here.” Rowan shot up from beneath the counter then with a key in his sweaty palm. Frazzled now, his face was as bit red as he held it out to the princess with shaky hands. “Originally. But we have lived under your father’s rule for many years.”
She’d been smiling before, at Finn, but Toren’s grin fell at Rowan’s words. Reaching out to take the key, their hands brushed and he nearly passed out.
“Yeah, well,” she answered easily. “We all have, I guess.”
He should’ve bitten his tongue, Rowan should’ve, but as her hand fell away from him, all he could think about was it returning.
“Princess Toren,” he whispered as she’d taken to glancing over the heavy, old room key. She was turning it over in her hand, even, when he whispered, “Don’t you remember me?”
Her eyes raised, cold blues up to his soft brown, but as Toren peered closer, still no recognition flashed. At all.
“No,” she answered slowly as Balt sighed beside her.
“The princess is quite forgetful,” he took over with a frown at the woman. “Of course, she recalls meeting you when…you came to the capital? On a trip? Or something similar?”
But Rowan wouldn’t look at Balt.
He knew Balt.
Even if the other man didn’t know him.
While remembrance hadn’t hit Toren yet, over at the door, it was slowly falling over Lia.
Rowan and Finn weren’t exactly common names…
If Lia gave her a bit more prompting, she was certain even her sister could eventually place them.
Rowan and Finn were the adopted children of their mother’s friend, Ava Hamins, the woman known for her feats on the battle field, as well as humanitarian efforts. She’d helped bring an end to the Great Wars, acting as the human go between for the other races in the Forest and beyond, helping to broker the marriage between the freshly crowned King Torcan and Availian Princess Asaeria.
Father and mother to Toren and Lia.
Ava had journeyed to the capital for some reason or another once, when the girls were young. Her mother had made a big deal of her coming, as did most of the castle. There was a big feast and Lia could recall being given a nice, flowing blue dress to dawn for the occasion.
Accompanying the former warrior had been the two orphan boys she’d adopted.
Though Lia had been much too shy to interact with the other children (she mostly kept to herself at that age), Toren had enjoyed showing off her home to two new playmates. When they had to return home, the girls’ mother had suggested to Toren that perhaps she write to Rowan, to keep in touch.
“When I was a girl in Availia,” Asaeria had sighed something of the like, “having the furthest letter mate was all the rage.”
But she wasn’t a girl then and it wasn’t at the time, and by the second or third letter, Toren was done with the concept. Out of sight, out of mind. Rowan was too far away to play with; writing him felt more like a chore, something tacked on to all of the studying she was meant to be doing at that age, which did little to breed desire.
Lia liked Rowan’s letters though.
The concept of them.
Reading and writing were a breeze for both the Aither children, something their mother lauded her husband came from their Availian heritage. Lia found that she enjoyed both very much and getting long letters from a friend, with the one caveat being you had to also write your own, was the exact kind of busywork the younger princess enjoyed.
So she wrote him back.
In her sister’s place.
It was simple enough. Her mother had given both Toren and Rowan, before he left, their own magic envelope. A mystic concept as a child, Lia had been enraptured with how all she had to do was write something, anything, on a slip of parchment and then fold it and place it in the envelope. So long as Rowan held the corresponding one, any message she dropped in the envelope would appear in his own.
When they were younger, the letters were very basic.
Rowan would write her about his chores, about people who came into the shop.
She’d return with the boring goings on of daily palace life.
Gradually, they formed something of a friendship.
Other than his brother, Rowan didn’t have many playmates and spent a lot of time writing to who he assumed to be Toren, the prospected future queen. Got to know her. Shared things with her.
Time passed and he got older, it felt like, faster than Lia. He did have two or three years on her. And when he started writing about how he wanted to see Toren again, about how he might be, well...falling for her, around the summer he turned thirteen, Lia agonized for days about what to do.
Equally because she wasn’t interested and she just knew this somehow would work its way back to Toren.
She didn’t know what punishment her sister could think up for impersonating her for years to some boy, but somehow, Lia didn’t imagine she’d easily laugh it off.
The next letter she wrote him bluntly explained that, as the future queen, she couldn’t really say she felt such a way about anyone and Lia had been pretty proud of the diplomacy the letter contained, given she was only eleven or so, but then Rowan never responded.
Slowly, she’d forgotten about him.
For a little while anyways.
Being the younger sister to someone as outgoing as Toren could make it difficult to get to know people. Especially when you were already othered through hierarchy. Lia was a princess, but not the princess. Getting in good with Toren was something most everyone did; she was more of an afterthought.
So she wrote Rowan.
A short letter, when she felt at her lowest.
Not to say that she was in love with him (or was she saying that Toren wasn’t in love with him?), but rather, first to apologize for the time that came between them and second to see if there were a chance he might like to start writing one another again?
The speed of his response wasn’t anticipated.
Less than a day later, Rowan penned her multiple pages apologizing for his behavior before and explaining his embarrassment over the entire ordeal. It was isolating, he wrote, life at the general store was, and she’d been his only outward source of interaction. When she wrote back rejecting him, he’d been crushed and taken to sulking over it for so long that, by the time he wanted to write her, so much time had passed that it felt inappropriate.
Lia was just glad to once more have a letter mate.
Admittedly, they were coming back into fashion once more...
Still, she and Rowan were back together again then, as friends, of course, and it was nice.
Lia found life in the palace equally as isolating, regardless of the endless streams of people about, and spent many days locked away in her room, drafting letters to the other teen or awaiting his. Having something to look forward to once more made the dredge of castle life bearable.
She’d last sent him a letter three weeks ago and gotten a prompt reply that she’d been too busy to contend with.
Now she was standing in the same room as him and the only person he could look at was Toren.
Of course.
From behind Radic, Lia wasn’t sure if she should speak up or not in regards to at least helping Toren recall the brothers. All she could do was grab Radic’s arm, getting a glance from the man, but his gaze remained mainly on her sister.
“We met you at the Castle,” Finn spoke up then. “Princess. Our mother took us there, to meet with yours.”
“Your mother?” Balt repeated, glancing about again. He’d ignored all the hung frames on the walls before, but glancing about them now, he could place the common denominator in them. His stomach clenched as he asked, “Is your mother-”
“Ava Hamin,” Finn assured him and oh fuck.
Fuck.
Balt felt his heart begin to race as he glanced over at Radic, the pair sporting similar expressions.
Ava had connections to crown. Every crown, really, just about, if the stories were to be believed. Balt only knew her name in passing, but the recognition was enough to short circuit his brain.
How could they have led the girls right to this place?
For Toren though, this fear wasn’t the focus as, instead, she was relieved to recognize the person before her.
Err, well, at least recalled their connection.
“Rowan,” Toren whispered with a soft smile that the man in question returned easily. “Of course I remember you.”
He laughed some, uncomfortable, before saying, “I just thought… My last letter, you didn’t respond-”
“I got busy,” Toren lied with a frown as she remembered then, yes, the letters. That they’d exchange. She wrote him twice, she was pretty sure, and then moved on. Right. “With things.”
“N-No, of course,” Rowan agreed and it was crazy to Lia, that only two people in the room were privy to something and, for once, she was in the know. It also wasn’t lost on her that Toren and the guy were misunderstanding one another just enough to skate by in their coversation conversation. She was sure this luck wouldn’t hold. Especially as Rowan insisted, “I was just worried that something had happened-”
“For years?” Toren questioned back which made him frown and begin to question her again, but someone else beat him to it.
“You guys,” Balt asked with a frown, glancing between his princess and the other teen, “exchange letters?”
“We did,” Toren told him with a roll of her eyes and a passing toss of her hand. “Years ago.”
Rowan thought he was catching on then. In the letters, Lia had been sure to include her sister’s...whatever she had with Balt, if only in hopes of avoiding Rowan ever venturing another leap at romance. So he knew enough about the Princess’s relationship with the other guy to know she might not be falling over herself to tell Balt about the letters.
It made sense.
He’d long reconciled to just being the guy in the letters.
But now she was here…
Had she…
Had she planned to come?
No.
On both princesses.
Toren was only standing there, in that moment, due to events she never could have planned for.
Lia was there to suffer. She was pretty sure. On the planet in general just to suffer. Absolutely.
The awkwardness of the situation was punctuated by Ava choosing that moment to return from her daily stroll out in the woods. At the sight of a carriage outside, the woman had rushed right in, surprised at first to find so many patrons, but then by who she recognized them to be.
“P-Princess,” she breathed at the sight of Toren standing before her counter, conversing with her son. “W-What… I’m honored by your presence. I- Two.” She’d turned to her side and seen Lia standing there, behind the royal guard, and bowed her head to the younger. “Both princesses. Well. I….” And she did the only thing she could thing to do then, bowing deeply at the waist, assuring the two women, “I am forever at your service.”
Ava was a human woman who’s midlife was passing her by. For her storied past, her warm, sepia brown skin was blemished with fading, purple scars. Old cuts and wounds that lingered beyond their welcome. Her nose had gone from slightly crooked in one direction to another, back in her fighting days. Even down to the way she walked, with a slight limp favoring her right side, came from an incident out on the battlefield. She still wore a similar buzz cut to her glory days and, though age did show in her wrinkled face, it was hard to believe decades had past since her name was last relevant in the land.
Her deep set, sea-green eyes stayed alight, no matter what enemy she was facing, and it was true to that day, as they roamed across the faces before her.
Toren held up her hand, dangling the key from it as she said, “Finn helped us set up a room.”
Behind her, this caused Rowan to nearly crumple to the floor while Finn fist pumped the air and jumped.
“A single room for the four people?” Rather than be impressed, Ava seemed perturbed. As Finn’s grin fell and Rowan’s frown did the opposite, the woman added, “And where were you then, when he was making the mistake, Rowan? Help your brother fix it. There are enough rooms for them all.”
“Excuse me, I’m sorry, but I think there’s been a misunderstanding,” Balt spoke up, taking a step towards the former warrior. He bowed deeply when he came to a stop, even more so, maybe, than she had done for the Princesses, before saying, “We do not intend on remaining here for long. Only a quick rest and then-”
“And then back on the road? So late at night and with one guard?” Ava frowned, but it wasn’t at Balt. “I find that hard to believe.”
Though her boys had assumed him so, Ava was certain Balt was no guard. To be so relaxed, out of armor, so close to the boarder, with both princesses?
She was still recovering from finding that there truly was merely one.
Her eyes landed on Radic, eyeing him heavily through the grating over his helmet. “Well? What sort of business would lead you all the way out here?”
But Radic didn’t rattle as easily as she’d feared.
“Confidential,” was his stern, deep reply and all three of his travel companions were thankful for the man’s even manner.
Still, Ava frowned some before remarking, “I will not allow you to travel at night. Or, at least, Princess Toren, I implore and advise you otherwise. If something happened to you out on these roads… You know your mother and I once knew one another. Your father as well. No, if they were to find out that I allowed you… I will either accompany you until your next destination or-”
“We’ll stay the night,” Toren interrupted quickly.
Talk of her parents would have gotten her to agree to most anything, so long as they quit speaking.
Radic didn’t give off any obvious signs of displeasure, but from directly behind him, Lia could see how the man tensed. Balt wasn’t as stoic, eyeing the Toren openly, but not otherwise speaking.
“It’s settled then,” Ava decided and she nodded at each of them in turn before saying, “You’ll stay, for now. I must hurry and prepare dinner for our guest. Finn, Rowan, see them to their rooms, the bathhouse, and the river, if they wish, before it gets too late in the night. Dinner will be ready, oh, surely no more than two hours.”
Which felt like a lifetime of minutes, Toren reasoned, to figure a way out of staying the night.