Requiem

Chapter 6

Kain

"Knock him out!"Aida's voice shouted from the garden walkway. Kain looked up from his stance and saw Aida waving her hands. Lorican gave him a pointed look, as if to ask, "What is this foolish girl doing here?"

"I mean, you can do it Kain! Knock him out!" She added, flustered, before walking away quickly with the dwelve at her heels.

Kain blinked, bewildered.

The knights were watching the girl, but with a high pitched whistle from Lorican they stood ramrod straight in attention. "Pay attention! If you want girls, then you better know how to save them!" He shouted. Then he began to mumble something about how he wasn't paid enough for training hormonal young men.

The two of them went back into position, but as Kain spun around and made an offensive sweep, he couldn't help but think of how peculiar that event was.

As Lorican raised his sword horizontally to block his attack, Kain began to think that maybe Aida was up to no good, and that Sanji was integrated into it. He would have to interrogate the dwelve later. Strange things were arising, too many in fact, and for the first time in years Kain had an unsure feeling about the future.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Aida

I was sitting in my room fingering the cracked, worn cover of the book that I had stolen from Kain's room. It had only been an hour since I told Sanjay to head to the apothecary. He had agreed begrudgingly, but told me to get him three blueberry scones for his task.

I couldn't wait to get that key and open the book that held the secret of my past...and Kain's. However, what worried me was losing Kain's trust afterward. I held a special spot for him, and I knew that I was just one of the few that he spoke to, so doing this...Never mind. I had to get past that. After all, he and that paunchy king had hidden so much from me! Finding out the truth overrides everything!

Nodding to myself in my resolve, I stood up and decided that it was high time for a nice, soothing bath before I advanced in my plans. I grabbed my towel from the end of my bed as well as a bottle of lightly scented lotion, a luxury that was given to me by the Queen every so often so that I didn't smell like a mutt.

I walked down to the end of the corridor and jogged downstairs to the bath area, where an old, smudged tub waited. Luckily, none of the maids were here, so I had the entire area to myself. Filling up the tub with steaming hot water, I carefully immersed my body into the water and closed my eyes. The warmth of the water calmed my nerves down and allowed me to drift into dreamland, where I was reunited with my real parents, and embraced me with open arms and told me that they loved me...And then my father would shake hands with Kain as he accepted Kain's marr---

"Ack!"

I choked on bath water and latched onto the sides of the tub as I quickly pull myself up. I coughed and placed a wet hand on my chest to steady my heart. Luckily, no one else was here to see my hysteria.

"Okay..." I panted. "...Time to get dressed."

I quickly pulled on my clothes, pushing back my impractical dream to the basement, then grabbed my towel and lotion and headed right out the door. The corridor had one or few maids about as I went back into my room, only to find Sanjay sitting on my bed with a bag in one hand and a juicy apple in the other. In a pile on the floor were a few apple cores.

"Where were ya? I've been a waitin' 'ere for 'early an hour!" Sanjay asked around mouthful of apple.

I sighed and shook my head. "Bathing." I replied and set my things on the bed. "You better clean up." I said pointedly.