[1] WEEPING MONK // you're not what I was looking for

7| The Ashes That Remain

═ 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝘼𝙨𝙝𝙚𝙨 𝙏𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙍𝙚𝙢𝙖𝙞𝙣 ═

[TW// referenced childhood trauma]

Ari and the Monk each realise their lives have more in common that they first thought, and Lancelot wrestles with some feelings.

Ari sat opposite to Lancelot across from a small fire which they'd built out in the forest, for the sun was beginning to die and light was fading through the trees. She was about to speak when they heard the cracking of twigs. Lancelot stood and unsheathed his sword within a second and looked back towards where they'd come from. A moment later the boy appeared, escorted by the elder Druid.

"We wanted to make sure you weren't dying in a ditch or something," Squirrel remarked as he walked over to the fire, making himself an uninvited guest as he slumped down cross-legged on the dry ground.

Ari smiled genuinely at him and his candidness. "We're just," she paused, thinking of the right way to conclude her response as she turned her face to Lancelot, "talking." The Fey queen didn't think that she would ever have a civilised conversation with the Weeping Monk, but here she was.

Zurah looked between them, seeing their ease and perhaps something else within the air which they did not. She turned to waddle away, "Well then, I'll leave you to it." 

The pair watched her leave, and when they fell into a comfortable silence, Ari began to explain what it was that the Monk wished to know. 

She told them the story of how The Hidden and the Fey were created from the drop of sunlight and the Earth Tree. She spoke of how their kind inherited powers over the three realms; earth, fire and water, from the first Sunborn, snd how some Fey have stronger abilities than others. Percival asked her hopefully if he would get any Fey powers, to which Ari dampened his spirits with her answer that he would have to wait until he was a little older to find out, for the Sky folk's abilities took a while to develop and not all Sky folk received these gifts. Natural talents for the elements were rare, even more so with their people being spread so far and thinly in hiding across the kingdom.

Lancelot watched the queen across from him articulate with intent as if he had never heard these stories before. He had, of course, when he was younger, but most of the details were lost to him now, replaced with the scriptures of the church. Her powers were unlike any that he had seen before, and he was amazed... though he would not let her know it.

Ari knew the question that was on Lancelot's mind, the same look in his eye as there had been before when he held her unbound wrist. "My powers aren't like any others," she began, keeping her gaze steady on his face highlighted harshly beneath that cowl by the warm firelight, "what you saw earlier was-"

"What happened earlier?" The boy cut in, sitting up taller.

"Percival," Lancelot warned at his artless interruption.