A KINGDOM UNDONE , original

nine

[ AMAYA HALE ]
[ ACT ONE : THE BLOOD MOON ]

The Halloway lights festival was as big as Amaya had assumed but she stayed by Sophia's side the entire time. It was almost much ado about nothing as a few meteorites passed the planet by the time which Sophia had released her fairy lights from the cauldron and they followed the direction of the meteorites, dissipating into nothing when the meteorites had passed by.

Now, she was back with John, laying on his front porch on a bench as John sat in a chair, both of them drinking and talking. Amaya held a hat over her head and closed her eyes. "This is good. We should do that more often." She drawled. John chuckled somewhere next to her. "You mean before or after you're Queen?" He asked her. They laughed then. "Man, I'm baked." She laughed, glancing at the ashtray and the three joints only smoked by her. While John stuck to the nectar, Amaya had raided her stash in his house. "Does-" John hiccuped and chuckled then, "Does your highness know that you're loving the recreational drug use?" John glanced at Amaya who'd taken the hat off her face and looked at him before she burst into laughter. Propping herself up on her elbows, she smiled with a white glaze in her eyes, "Actually, you know what? It hasn't come up." She laughed then, falling back on the bench. "Well, bottoms up." John clinked his bottle to something and there was a metallic clinging sound.

꧁⸻꧂

Amaya must have dozed off because there was a soft blanket draped over her body and her hat was sitting on the ground, the ashtray was clean and the bottle and glasses were gone. John was gone as well and Amaya rose to her feet, pulled the blanket tighter around her body and went inside. She found John cooking in the kitchen, the smell of pancakes hitting her fine nose.

"Ooh, please, tell me you're sharing." She looked up to see John in a happy mood, grinning to himself as music was playing softly on a record player from somewhere. "You know I am. First, though, I have to tell you something." Amaya raised a perfect brown eyebrow and looked up to him as she sat down at the counter.

"Sebastian's off world, dealing with something. In the interim Amaya will meet with Sophia and get a taste of the crown. His words, not my own. Although I would've used similar words." He smiled as he handed her a hot plate with two large pancakes.

"Yeah, okay." She dug into the pancakes after putting raspberry jam on it and munched on them happily. Amaya had no idea what he would mean by that but right now it didn't matter. She was coming off a high and had fantastic food. "Gods do I have love the world right now!" She mumbled with a full mouth and John let out a snicker as he turned off the stove and sat down with his pancakes, eating almost instantly and burning his mouth. John was good at cooking, it was one of her favorite things about him.

"What'll you do today?" Amaya asked him, having finished her plate, drawing the blanket tighter around her thin body. "Library's closed but I'm gonna get there anyway. The place is a mess after the Lights, too many revilas got there early yesterday and checked out books about the meteors and whatnot." He shrugged and looked down at his mug.

He nodded at her then, looking at her fingers. "You didn't quite tell me about this one." Something mischievous sparkled in his eyes and Amaya looked down to the ring, the ember stone shining beautifully, sitting in the silver band. It was probably her only silver jewelry. She shrugged then, "Nothing to tell. It was a gift from Sebastian."

Amaya looked up to see him grinning. "Gods, you're a bad liar." Amaya's eyebrows crinkled together. "What's that expression anyway? Gods?" She asked slowly, almost drawing out the last word. John tilted his head, set the mug down. Amaya wondered what was in it. "You don't know about the-" Amaya shook her head and John laughed. "I mean I use it as much as I use swear words but I don't know." She whispered, shrugging her shoulders.