I left Dranii with Uraia with a feeling that while I had put one issue to bed, that of refusing an alliance with King Gregorio, I had many more issues that I needed to think about thanks to my conversation with Prince Philip. but thinking about these issues needed to wait until after Uraia and I had talked. When I returned to the castle with Philip she was as cold to me as she had been the night before. In the air on the way back to Aseron she kept her distance from me, staying only close enough to keep me in her sight. I hated that there was tension between me and Uraia, and I couldn't wait until we had returned to the palace to clear up whatever it was that was responsible for Uraia feeling this way. I had Myra wait for Uraia and Igor to catch up to us.

"Uraia, what's wrong?" I asked her when they'd reached us.

Uraia didn't respond; she looked at me with a countenance of stone and had Igor take off at great speed. Myra and I took off after them, having to travel at full speed. Igor was big enough to carry Uraia but he still wasn't fully grown; Myra was faster. Every time we caught up with them, Uraia would have Igor make a sudden direction change to get away from us before continuing to fly away from us at top speed. This mid-air dance between us continued for several minutes until Uraia realized that she couldn't outrun us with Igor and went into a sharp nosedive. She and Igor landed in a glen in the middle of a forest beneath us which Myra and I followed them into.

"Talk! Uraia, talk to me!" I dismounted and said to her.

"Where did you go with him?" She asked with pain in her voice and on her face.

"This is about Philip?"

"You didn't want to separate from him last night, I've never seen you like that with anyone before."

"They were our hosts, I was just being polite, and the reason why you've never seen me like that with anyone before is because the only person I've been like that with is you."

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"Where did you go with him?"

"He took me to a log cabin where he introduced me to Griselda, the woman he loves, and told me that he has no intention of agreeing to any of his father's marriage proposals."

Uraia let out a small laugh when she heard my answer, a small laugh that was followed by her crossing her arms and then putting a hand over her face. I had never seen Uraia cry before, and I was unable to process the experience of it.

"Talk to me, Uraia; please, just talk to me."

"Everything has changed so much, your duties as queen are taking up more and more of your time and now that I'm not the captain of your guard I hardly get to see you. It feels like it's only a matter of time before your responsibilities as queen take you away from me completely."

"Do you really think that I would let that happen?"

"It's going to happen whether you like it or not, fulfilling your duties as queen is the most important thing, there's no escaping that."

Much of what Uraia said was true, and it forced upon me the realization that I couldn't put off telling Uraia how I felt any longer.

"Uraia, listen to me. You are everything to me; ever since that night when I first saw you the only thing I've ever wanted is to be as strong as you. When you started coming to the settlement to train me, the thought of disappointing you terrified me because I was afraid that if I disappointed you you would stop coming to the settlement and I wouldn't get to see you anymore. And when the settlement was massacred and you came for me, all I could think of was that as long as I had you, as long as you were there for me, I would be fine. I love you, Uraia; I love you so much it hurts, it hurts that I can't reach out and touch you softly when you're close, that I can't put my arms around you when we're alone and kiss you."

After hearing these words, Uraia lowered her arms and turned to me.

"You can."

Kissing Uraia, I was taken back to that night in the Okwari village after the massacre when she'd kept me in her arms the whole night. I was finally getting to experience the intimacy that up to that point I had only been able to imagine and dream about, and I wished that it could go on forever.