𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐈𝐍𝐃 | ❝Hope is good, Hope will never disgrace, but make no mistake, Hope will hit you in the face!❞
In which the Just King becomes betrothed to a princess from a neighboring kingdom, only to fall in love with the prin...
WALKING IN THE WIND xii. FRESH AIR AND DEAD LANGUAGES
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BEFORE THEY COULD DECIDE what to do next, the group of travelers took it upon themselves to rest, clean up, and get some proper food in their system. It had been a long 24 hours for all of them, and the upcoming days weren't getting any shorter. With a gruesome war on the way, it seemed silly to neglect even the most basic self-care. They needed to be prepared for anything. Besides, why would anyone want to enter a battle already bruised and beaten?
Hope found settling in to be quite difficult, considering everyone either hated her or felt otherwise indifferent toward her. Somehow, dealing with both sides was equally as terrible.
Firstly, there was Prince Caspian X, who Hope punched in the face before either could adequately introduce themselves. She hadn't spoken to him much since then, and she didn't plan on it. She didn't have much of a reason why, but she wasn't very fond of him already. She figured it had something to do with him disrespecting her boundaries.
She also didn't like Caspian because she didn't fully trust him. He was a Telmarine, after all. His people were the reason the Narnians were battling extinction in the first place. She thought that was enough of a reason, personally. How could anyone want such a beautiful land to crumble?
Hope did, at the very least, feel some empathy toward him after discovering he was forced to flee Telmar because his uncle and aunt ordered their soldiers to kill his nephew for the throne. The only reason he was still alive to lead the war against the Telmarines, who thought Narnians were extinct all this time, was because of his private tutor.
She wouldn't confess this aloud, but Hope was only empathetic because the same thing happened to her — except the person who saved her was her best friend (and a wooden wardrobe).
Speaking of Odette, they hadn't spoken to each other since yesterday. Hope wasn't interested in chatting with Odette either (for obvious reasons), which turned out to be a nightmare in itself. Everyone was interested in Wysteria, making it nearly impossible to ignore Odette's existence. Everyone spoke of the lost princess and handmaid endlessly.
Right. Hope kept forgetting she wasn't a handmaid anymore. She was a queen. How strange. She'd been hoping she could bury this whole thing in the past, but she couldn't escape it. Her mistakes were written on the walls and buried in history books. They lingered within Cair Paravel's ashes and the hearts of the Narnians. Her past wasn't only her present, but it was her future, too.
It felt like the only people Hope was comfortable being around at the moment were Peter and Lucy. Susan only ever spoke to Hope with a harsh glare, and Edmund was... Well, Edmund was Edmund. But at least she had the oldest and youngest to keep as close company for now.
