A long day of discussion left everyone tired, especially Lar who appeared ready to pass out. Thankfully Rinas had prepared a ride for the three of them with an invitation for Juna to stay at his place as well.

As they left the carriage ride and found themselves at the front steps of Rinas’s mansion, Reginald and Regina greeted them by standing out in the cold night.

“Welcome back,” Reginald said while his sister appeared completely uninterested in greeting them warmly.

“Prepare another room for our new guest,” Rinas said to the two of them.

“As you wish father,” Reginald replied. “Come on sister, let us do as Father has asked.” Regina reluctantly followed her brother who was always willing to carry out his duties while she would rather not but did so anyways lest she incur the wrath from her father.

“You’re welcome to stay here for the night Juna. As for you two, when you’ve both fully recovered, we will make a final determination on where you’ll end up at.” He clasped his hands together behind his back. “Now then, let us all hopefully rest well after a long day.”

Kiran felt immediate relief from the cold outdoors when he made it inside. A rush of blood flooded his cheeks and rather than linger around, he chose to head to his provided bedchamber so he could finally rest.

As he sat atop the bed taking his boots off, a knock came to his door. “Come in,” he said loudly enough for the person on the other side to hear.

Lar slowly opened the door peeking her head in through the crevice. He gestured for her to come in and close the door behind her. Due to her recovering state, she had an almost limp-like walk and kept her shoulders slumped down awkwardly.

“Hey,” she said softly. “I wanted to talk to you about some of the things discussed during that meeting.”

“It couldn’t wait until tomorrow?”

She gave him a side-eyed glance. “Well, sure, I could’ve waited. But I’m a little concerned you see.” She pulled over the chair and sat in it while he kept seated on the bed.

He pulled his arms back and pressed his palms down onto the mattress keeping him upright at an angle. “What’s on your mind then?”

“Don’t you think it’s a little reckless to willingly throw yourself at the queen? It almost feels like you’re wanting to die or something.”

“That’s not my reasoning at all,” he said. “I just think that waiting around is a risk in and of itself. From everything I’ve heard, the queen is striking the coalition with all that she can. Bold actions might very well be all that we can do now with everything that’s happening.”

She didn’t appear entirely convinced. “Well, regardless, I won’t be able to help you if you decide to go through with this plan of yours. I’m not in any condition to do any fighting at least not anytime soon.”

“That’s alright. You’ve fought enough. It’s all you’ve been doing since I met you.”

“You know, you’re right.” She began to smile deviously. “I should’ve just left you outside of that jail and gone on my merry way back then. I hadn’t been in any fights for a long time until you came around. Now look at me.” She made a slight gesture down her front body that had taken a good amount of bruises, cuts, and injuries all to keep his sorry self alive.

“I get the feeling that trouble naturally surrounds me. It’s like it, or either I, am drawn to it.”

“There’s a saying from where I come from that goes something like this: those who always experience trouble, are the trouble themselves.”

While her tone suggested she said such a thing in a half-serious manner, there may have been more truth to it than he might want to admit to himself.

“Listen,” she said softly, “it’s unlike me to, uh, talk about certain things. But you and I are pretty close now at this point so I trust you to not use it against me.”

“Let it all out Lar.”

“I’m just worried about you. Everything that’s gone on recently has been a real mess. And here you are standing tall and an unwavering soul despite it all. But I’m worried you might be taking dramatic actions that could cost you your life without pausing to take it all in.”

“What should I do then? Should I try to live a quiet life instead? Are you perhaps now having doubts about us being in the coalition?”

“Not entirely,” she said. “But it’s not just about that. It’s just I think it might be wise to slow things down a little.”

While he appreciated Lar’s attempt to speak to him on a more emotional level, she wasn’t being completely upfront with him with her true feelings or at least that was how he perceived it.

“It’s alright Lar. You can just tell me outright that you don’t want me to confront the queen.”

She sighed and leaned back in her chair. “I don’t. It’s too much of a risk.”

“She murdered Della.”

“I know. You have every right to want to kill her. I know I do on some level for that and much more. I’m just afraid that you’re being reckless.”

“I appreciate the concern but I’m fine.”

“Are you though?”

Her comment irritated him. It was the first time he felt immense irritation towards her since they bonded their souls. Calm down Kiran. This is your companion.

He calmed himself knowing his companion had his back and wasn’t going out of their way to irritate him. She kept looking at him waiting for him to respond not daring to look away from his eyes. “Alright fine,” he said. “I’m a little unsure about things and I might be struggling a little with what I should be doing.”

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“Good good,” she said. “I’m glad you’re at least being open about it with me. If you want, I’d be willing to give you a good hug to make it all better.”

“A hug from you? I’d only expect you to begin clawing away at my back if given the opportunity.” He smiled finding himself becoming more at ease. “I am curious however now that I have the opportunity to ask.”

“Oh?”

“It’s about you and Yorais.”

“Oh. What about her?”

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?”

He began to squint towards her. “She already admitted to me that you two know each other.”

“Did she now? She promised…” Lar began to form a fist and quickly relinquished it. “Yeah well, I don’t really want to talk about our prior relations.”

“It appears quite evident to me that you two much have quite the history. And I’m guessing neither of you expected to run into each other again?”

“Yeah.” Lar began to cross her arms whilst she sat angrily in the chair beside his bed. “We went our separate ways and that was that. Oh how lucky for me to find her in one of the few organizations that I thought would be ideal for us to join. Now I’m regretting us having ever joined this coalition to begin with.” She blew out air from her mouth in frustration. “But there’s nothing to be done about it now.”

“Can I ask why exactly you two aren’t on great terms or is that something you’d prefer to keep private?”

“We both swore to each other to keep our relations only to ourselves.”

“Then that’s a no.”

She nodded her head. Now I want to know what the deal is between them. I guess I’ll have to dig a little at a future time and maybe learn about their history.

He couldn’t help but think that the two of them certainly looked somewhat similar. They both had long white hair and yellow eyes although their physiques were quite different. Yorais was quite a bit taller than Lar and tall for a woman in general. She also had a more mature face and body while exhibiting youthful features. He still felt that her appearance was deceptive of her real age making him think she used some kind of sorcery to keep herself relatively young in appearance compared to her true age.

Lar stood up from the chair looking ready to leave. “I guess I’ll go and leave to allow you the opportunity to rest,” she said walking away. “I’m also about ready to pass out myself.”

“Don’t pass out on your way back to your room.”

“I’ll try not to,” she said walking out through the door.

While he fell over onto his back on the bed feeling exhausted after a long day, several knocks hit his door. “Who else dares disturb me at this hour?”

Someone on the other side of the door yelped due to his dramatic reply “Um, is this a bad time?” Juna asked in a muffled voice.

“It’s fine,” he said staring up at the ceiling, “come in.”

The door squeaked a little as they entered and closed it shut. He saw what looked like her in his bottom peripheral vision as he kept laying there. He decided to thrust his body forward so he could sit there appropriately before her.

“It’s alright if I come by another time,” she said, “I just figured that since I’m here for tonight that I would come over briefly.”

“What is it that you want?”

She clasped her hands behind her back only to make a bit of a silly face. “Well, now I’m questioning my decision to bring it up. Maybe I should just ask tomorrow when you don’t look so tired.”

Do I really look that tired right now? He certainly felt exhausted but without a mirror, he couldn’t rightfully suggest otherwise when she was the one capable of observing his physical appearance unlike himself right now.

“If you must talk to me at this hour, then I shall permit it. Although I must say Juna,” he said with a brief pause, “I didn’t hear you say much during the meeting today. Why is that? Normally you’re so willing to speak your mind and rattle out a million words like it’s nothing.”

She rubbed the back of her head. “I struggled to think of anything to say. Everyone else just seemed like they had everything figured out.”

“That’s alright, we can’t all be smart.”

“Hey!” She said thrusting her hand softly against his shoulder. He began to laugh a little. This brief moment of laughter soon faded however as it appeared heavy thoughts loomed within her mind. Something is weighing heavily over her. That must be why she chose to come see me.

“Careful Juna, you’ll end up soaking wet if that storm cloud over your head grows any larger.”

“You know Kiran, I think you might be better suited to being a court jester than working for the coalition.”

“I bet it pays better. But more seriously, what exactly are you wanting to bring up to me?”

For a second she likely pondered on whether or not she ought to go into it, but she appeared ready to commit since he made it clear that he was willing to hear her out.

“This is going to sound ridiculous coming from me. I’m just a bit concerned about you is all.”

“Don’t tell me you’re concerned about me as well. You’re not the first to tell me that tonight.”

“You certainly make it easy to be concerned especially when you’re planning on confronting the queen directly! I mean geeze Kiran, that’s a bold maneuver that I nor most other people would ever think to do. I can tell that you’re quite adamant about confronting her though considering what she did so I get it.” She avoided his eyes briefly before looking into them again. “I actually wanted to come by so that we could maybe, I don’t know, talk a little about what happened to Della.”

When she said her name, he felt his stomach drop. The thought of her brought his mind to dark thoughts and the sight of her that he did not want to remember her by. He still wore the necklace he had given her to this day reminding him of a far greater time in which he had given it to her on a whim.

“We don’t have to go into it if you don’t want to,” Juna went on to say, “I’d at least like to say that if you’re ever wanting to talk it the whole thing that I’m willing to lend my ear to you.”

“That’s very thoughtful of you Juna. Would you perhaps be fine with talking about it all another time? Truthfully speaking, I’m about ready to pass out. It’s been an incredibly long day, and frankly, I’m a little surprised to see that you’re even still up after eating all of that food earlier.”

“I’m made of tougher stuff than you may think,” she said. “But I understand if you don’t want to talk about it right now. I suppose I’ll go then and see you later so you can finally get some much-deserved rest.” She got up and left leaving him to be all alone to drift into the many thoughts that ran through his mind.

While her gesture was a kind one, the last thing he felt like doing at this moment in time was going through the recent tragic events with another person that he found himself trusting. And it didn’t matter whether it was Juna, Lar, or anyone else offering a chance to talk about this personal issue or any other issue. He merely thought it best for now to keep it to himself. It also felt much easier to just keep those thoughts of his as far in the recesses of his mind as he reasonably could and just keep pushing forward resolving himself for oncoming conflicts he was willing to toss himself into.

He had to focus instead on other matters of import and there was just so much to be done in the coming days. They all had to work smart and fast. If he was to in fact succeed he had to start training again, but before he could do that, he had to fully recover. Once he did that, he could begin preparing for that day when he would try to position himself to put an end to Queen Luvia Aenveld.

Such a bold endeavor held immense risk, however. He knew this, and they all knew it as well. What other choice do we have? She was a threat to all of their livelihoods and there was unlikely to be any peace to be achieved between her side and theirs. Bold action must be taken. Otherwise, we’ll all end up dead.