The Elvish Princess

Chapter Five

Silence accompanied the riders. For the past three days hardly anyone spoke. A dark cloud seemed to hang over Clair and the rest of the company seemed to realize it. 

The princess, who had been more exposed to the element than she ever had before, looked like she had been dragged through hell and back almost. Her eyes had lost almost all the light in them, her hair was now a dull yellow color, the blue dress she wore which once looked like the night sky that hung over head now looked an almost black color, a foreboding blue color before a torrential rain storm, and shadows rimmed her eyes from the lack of sleep she had been getting. To say she looked like death would've been an understatement.

She was tired, achy, hungry and she wanted to go home. Home to Lenad, the country she grew up knowing and loving. A place were the music was alive with color and feeling, where her friends were, were countless memories were. A place where every fall the grain turned a golden brown and the autumn flowers bloomed bright purples, burgundy and a deep red amongst the back drop of a blue sky. Where every winter, snow covered the ground, not a lot but enough to make everything look like it was dusted with a heavy coat of sugar. Were every spring the fields would bloom with so many different colors it seemed like you were in a painting, were the rains fell so softly sometimes you could barely tell it was raining or when they fell so heavy and fast you couldn't see three feet in front of you. And in the summer, her favorite season, when the yellow sun would turn her skin brown and her hair ever-more golden, when she rode horses till the night came and then returned to the castle for the summer feasts and dined with princes and nobles and servants and the common folk all alike in the streets of her city, where everyone was equal. 

She cringed to think about what her life would be like in Arobyn. She had learned as a girl that the elves were a barbaric kind. No one was equal, and the High Elves of Arobyn were even more ruthless than the rest. She had seen pictures of them, pale and sickly. With eyes so blue they almost seemed white, and jet black hair that made them look even more like ghosts...or death. As she looked around to the elves around her, though pale, they still seemed like moonlight to her, not barbaric like the pictures she had seen of the High Elves. And soon she would be married to the Prince of the High Elves, she didn't even know his name.

"Princess," a knight spoke to the left of her, "We are stopping to water the horses. There is also a small cove where we are stopping of you would like to bathe."

Clair locked eyes with the knight but didn't say a word, she turned the black mare to follow the others. She could hear the sound of water, rushing and bubbling over stones and branches in the water and her heart quickened at the thought of a bath, even if these elves were around. Soon they rounded a corner and the stream was even more welcoming than she could've imagined. Crystal water flowed freely down the banks and she could see small, brightly colored fish swimming with the current. The horses' ears pricked forward as their riders dismounted and slipped their bridles off the heads to allow them to drink more freely. 

Stroking the neck of her mare Clair looked around her to see if she could spot the cove where she would be able to bathe. Scanning the banks, it was almost as if she could see little eyes peering out at her from the bushes, but she brushed it off, telling herself it was just her tired imagination making things up.

"Princess, if you would like to bathe before we reach the Palace, here are some things,"she turned towards a knight that she had heard Thimben call Valgaen and gave him a soft smile in which he returned. Taking the thing from his hands, she then followed him around a bend and down a length of the stream to a rock face. As they rounded it a whole new world was developed before her eyes. On this back side of the rock was a small cove just like they had said, with the sam crystal water that flowed from the stream. A small waterfall fell from the top of the rock face, she assumed from a creek above or some other magical influence here in the Daener Wood, and high green grass surrounded the cove which would allow her complete privacy. She sighed inwardly and looked towards Valgaen and nodded her thanks, which he again returned before turning and striding off to where they came.