The Exiled Gem

Rise in Correspondence

327 B.C. - Doveland

Time heals all wounds
-Stephen King

Another whole year passed too fast. Raw pain still throbbed in Alexandra's chest if ever her thoughts wandered to Master George. Doveland was not as bad as before- another trip into the Palace had confirmed her notions that Ethoris had yielded some help.

Though now, more complicated planning and plotting was going on. It was not possible to visit Palaces and Meeting rooms every single day- but the situation demanded it. Alexandra had half a mind to write back to the Council and ask for reinforcements, but she didn't want to burden them further- nowadays, there was tremendous pressure on the council. Half their strength was in Ethoris- which they had marked as "Red Zone". It meant nothing but "High Danger Zone". Doveland was one of their "Green Zones" or "No Danger Zone", so she couldn't possibly hanker them with her suspicions.

For this morning, she'd chosen up their Military Camp- it was the MOST DANGEROUS SPOT of any country. But the most dangerous spot was also the spot were most important activities happened.

In the past two months- she had observed Austin's meetings with the Ethorians, they all pointed towards a single thing - Joint Campaigns. All Alexandra understood from that term, "Joint Campaigns" was that they would join their forces and invade places. To her, this sounded barbaric. But then, almost everything related to Ethoris sounded barbaric.

Alexandra felt a strange sort of detachment ever since the Funeral. The older she got - the more fragile life seemed. The reason she was planning to spy at their Military Base - a place where she had 99.99% chance of getting caught.

The prospect seemed strangely exciting. Being caught - Austin would know she was a spy... what would his reaction be?

Anger and feeling of betrayal. He'll have your neck.
The exact, spirit-dampening sort of thing her mind could be expected to speak.

Alexandra's eyes then fell on the stack on letters in the corner. They were piled up on the window sill, sunlight filtering through their blunt edges and illuminating the black ink address on each. There would be what - two hundred letters in it? More than that - definitely. Over that past year, she had corresponded HEAVILY, with Fannel, with Watson, with Diana, with Kane, with Sarah and Betty, even with Liam and Paul.

She had got rid off almost all of those letters - which went over a thousand. These two hundred important ones remained, and needless to say, Jade was always in a bad mood.

The top of the pile was Paul's letter- in which he said it was an utter foolish mistake on his part and that they could at least be friends. That letter had made Alexandra's day, when she had returned from having her head smacked across by a misbehaved guard whom she had dealt with and taught a lesson.

Now they were actually good friends - something which mildly surprised Alexandra. Maybe because they had always been so messed up together - first rivals, the rivalry extending to sabotaging. Then middling friends, never too close - finally the scandal at the funeral. But it was one of those things Alexandra would like to do - just because somebody's proposal was rejected, it didn't mean they had to become what was termed as "silent enemies". They could be "open friends", just as well.

Watson had owned up to something incredibly insane. The very second letter had his hurried, sloppy handwriting with almost all letters in capitals - he had confessed having grown intense feelings for Diana.

Alexandra had replied with the first thing that came to her mind- Mark Fannel will have your skin, I'm pretty sure.

Which lead to the next problem - Marilyn finding out that Fannel - that all of them - were Vedessan. She had had a nice little tantrum about it - how her parents would send her to hell, but not to Idgard. How it was considered a treason in Losiane to marry outside the DK. How Fannel expected her to make all the adjustments and sacrifices.