Silver Mask

Chapter 11 - Mare

I'm standing in the courtyard. Alone. Drowning in my thoughts. In my hand, there's a letter. It's from the Scarlet Guard. No, scratch that. It's from Kilorn.

Dear Mare,

I don't have much time, so this letter will be breif. The Scarlet Gard is going to attack Corvium in a month. End the war quikly and you might stop it. Don't come. If we see you fihting with them, you'll be on our wanted list until the day you diye. I don't trust Maven, but I trust you. Hury.

Kilorn

P.S. Gisa wanted me to give this to you

There is a fifth earring in my ear; winter blue. It's the twin to the earring I gave Gisa months ago. It seems like it's been a lifetime since then. I miss her so much. For the first time since I moved into my old rooms, I feel homesick. I want to go back to may family, but I also don't want to abandon Maven on his journey to making Norta a better place.

After sitting down and mulling the situation over in my head for a bit, a decide who to consult. They'll give me an honest and unbiased opinion on what to do. Yep, it's time to visit the silver devil.

I open the door to Evangeline and Elane's rooms to find them (thankfully) dressed and chatting. Wordlessly, I hand them the letter.

"A letter from your Red pet?" Evangeline asks snidely, taking the letter.

"Don't call him that," I snap, voice steely.

"So, your friend Kilorn with the bad spelling," she amends, skimming over the letter and handing it to Elane.

"It's not his fault! He just learned to read!" I retort. Evangeline raised an eyebrow, and Elane put a hand on her arm, stopping her from insulting Kilorn further.

"Well then, cut to the chase. Why are you here?" Evangeline asked, sighing heavily and handing back the letter, "We were in the middle of a very important conversation. About your wedding."

I ignored the second part of her comment.

"Should I leave?" I blurted out. They stared at me, confused.

"Leave the room?" Evangeline asked.

"No, no. I meant, should I leave the castle?" I say quickly.

"You're homesick." Elane states, giving me a sympathetic smile. I open my mouth to disagree, but then I nod slowly.

"But you also don't want to leave Maven stranded with the wolves," Evangeline finishes, refering to the High Houses.

"Yeah, that's basically it," I say sadly. Then I scold myself. I've faced down far worse than a bout of homesickness.

"And now you want us to tell you what to do, correct?" Evangeline asked. I nod again.

"Homesickness is natural," Elane says comfortingly.

"If you want me to be blunt with you, you've got one choice to make. What do you want? To live out the rest of your life in peace with your family and have all of your problems solved for you? Or to have a hand in making blood equality, even if you are only known as just a helper?" Evangeline's dark eyes pierce mine, and I make my decision. "That's what I thought." Evangeline says smugly.

"You guys are the best!" I call as I leave their suite.

"No problem, come to us anytime for advice," Elane answered sweetly. As I close the door, I could swear I hear Evangeline say,

"Never thought I'd hear those words coming out of Barrow's mouth." I chuckled as I walked over to Maven's rooms.