Last Legend

Chapter 10: Morning

Morning came, and again, Gemma was woken up by Keylla's noises. The thief was muttering to himself across the small room seated in the chair, seemingly frustrated with the dark gray bandana he was retying around his left wrist. Apparently, it did not want to cooperate with the knot he was trying to tie.

"Damned Kingy woke me up this early…" the knot finally came together. And it seemed that she was not frustrated with the knot so much as she was with Roni. When did the king come in?

Keylla glanced over at Gemma, "Morning Gem, sorry if I woke you up." She leaned down to grab her boots and yanked them on roughly, "His royal highness wants us to meet with him in Aaron's study." Keylla said this with a mocking accent, trying to mimic Roni. Gemma let out a giggle, to which Locke grinned while lacing up his boots.

"Alright, are we going to have breakfast first though?" Gemma asked, pushing back the blankets, and raising her arms high to try to stretch out her tight muscles. She supposed she was tensing up a lot lately…

"Nope, the jerk says he'll have tea waiting for you, but apparently this is 'important,'" Keylla scowled down at her feet. "I don't get why it couldn't wait a bit, but oh no, they gotta talk now."

"What time is it?" Gemma asked, moving to the edge of the bed, and reached for her boots under the table across from her. The room was so small that she was able to grab them easily. She had not noticed the night before how tiny the room was! She must have been more tired than she remembered.

"It's five-thirty! I thought we would be able to get a few more hours of sleep in," she huffed, folding his arms. "I'm going to need more than my normal three cups of coffee if I'm gonna be able to be useful at all today."

Gemma stood up carefully to avoid knocking over the candle placed on the shelf carved out of the rock wall above the bed. She ran her fingers through her hair, and they got caught in a few snarls. Maybe after talking with Roni and Aaron, she could take a bath. Keylla opened the door and held it open for her while she was pulling at her ribbons to fluff them up around her ponytail. She had left her cloak in the room. The hideout was very warm due to the fireplaces, lamps, and candles alight all over the place.

They passed by a couple of Reigniters in the passageway who were arguing about guard duty. One claimed that he deserved a break since he had been doing guard duty for the last week, while the other claimed that she needed a day off from it because she was preparing to travel up north. Their voices receded as Gemma followed Keylla up a few steps and into the dining room. Rene was seated at the bar sipping at a big mug of coffee while chattering away with the young red-haired woman who was holding a tray with a teapot and a stack of toast.

"Lucky bastard…" Keylla pouted, turning her head away and briskly passed through on the outskirts of the dining tables to reach the doorway in the back of the room. She was still muttering to herself about coffee and being starved to death when they entered Aaron's study and led Gemma to a pair of oversized cushiony armchairs.

She dropped herself down into her seat and was glaring daggers at Roni while Gemma took the seat next to him.

"Good morning, Gemma, I hope you slept well?" Roni gave her that gallant smile and handed her a cup of tea from across the small table at the center of their seats. The tea was a pale orange color and smelled like flowers. She thanked the king with a smile and blew across the top of the drink to cool it.

"I slept fine. I hope you did as well," Gemma replied, watching as Roni poured himself a cup of the flowery tea. She noticed that the room was much brighter than the night before due to a roaring fire to their left. Gemma was able to see maps nailed into the stone walls with different things drawn on them, lines linking between the continents, between cities. Above the fireplace was another carved-out shelf with a line of bottles in different shapes containing amber and scarlet liquids.