Lunar

Chapter 7: Princesses

Naddy walked into the training to find a girl around her age seated next to Darry on the bench. She had the same dark blonde hair as Darry but she had gorgeous sea green eyes unlike Darry's stunning blue ones. Trust the royals to all have gorgeous eyes, everyone non-royal person she'd seen had lovely normal ones.

She walked over to the pair when Darry beckoned for her, and when she came to a halt he introduced them.

"Naddy this is my younger sister Eloise. Elle this is Nadira or Naddy as she prefers,"

Naddy politely smiled at the princess while Elle glared back. "I'm bored so I'm watching today's training,"

"Uhh ok.."

Darry stood up and Naddy followed him into the centre of the room, before the started Darry murmured "Don't worry it's just Elle, being nervous will mess with your training,"

Naddy nodded then quickly blocked when Darry through a punch at her, signifying the start of the day's training.

They punched and blocked eachother until Darry was satisfied they could move on to swordplay, so they only swung at eachother for ten minutes.

Darry grabbed a sword off the rack ",None of our swords will cut someone who has good intentions so you shouldn't have to worry about being cut but you can still be badly bruised from the hit. However, so we don't risk it, I'm going to run the edge of this sword along your palm,"

Naddy nodded and held out her hand, when the sword didn't cut her Darry handed her a sword of her own to practice with. Darry then taught her how to spar and proper sword manoeuvres.

They carried on like that for a while, stabbing, thrusting and parrying eachother. Elle watched the entire time.

They finally stopped when Naddy twisted her wrist wrong, sprained it and got her sword stuck in the wooden floor simultaneously.

When Darry looked at her there was warmth and tenderness in his eyes again. Sitting at the sideline, Elle noticed the change in her brother's demeanor and watched carefully, stiffing up taller to get a better view. Darry healed Naddy's wrist and passed her her sword, noticing Elle he shook his, the barrier was back.

They went back to sparring and after another hour Darry let her off for a couple hours so she'd have renewed her energy for the evening lesson.

~*~*~*~*~

That evening Naddy met Dill and Darry on the lawn outside the training grounds.

"Hey guys!" She said jumping into a halt in front of them

"Hey Naddy! Long time no see!" Dill replied playfully

"I know! Gosh I haven't seen you since this morning! And Darry, I haven't seem you in two hours!" She held up two fingers and waved them dramatically

"I hope you've spent those two hours wisely Naddy, because you are doing manifestation now that the moons out. Dylan here will be your instructor while I'll supervise. And no funny business from you two, got it?"

"Yup! Cya!" She grinned and waved him off

Not seeming to believe he should grace her with a reply, he went and sat on the grass then motioned for them it get on with it.

"Okay, so Naddy?"

"Yes Dill?"

"Try to manifest a rose like you did that first night, you know, the night you turned invisible, scared the sh*t out of me then fell off the couch?"

"Dill! Language!" She said and hit him playfully on the head

"Oops!" He popped the 'p' ,"but you know what I mean?"

"Yeah I know," she sighed as she manifested a captivatingly beautiful rose.

When Naddy stared at the rose for a bit too long, Dill grabbed her shoulders and shook her. She burst out laughing then stopped just a quickly and shyly glanced over at Darry, who was -despite himself- grinning madly at the pair.

Her lesson went from 6-7 pm, and throughout the hour Dill got her to manifest a variety of objects, including but not limited to, swords, daggers, chairs, pillows, phones chargers...
All the while, Naddy kept glancing at Darry which Dylan of course noticed and decided to bring up later.

During the last 20 minutes Elle came over and let Darry away to talk to him. Dill thought it was a perfect time to voice his suspicion, after all what better time than the present?

"Naddy, you seem distracted," he whisper-yelled

"W-what! I am not!"

"You are a terrible liar, never play poker,"

"Why would you think I'm lying?" She crossed her arms

"You like Darius, don't you?"

"No,"

"Naddy..." He sighed "We grew up together,"

"So?"

"So I can tell when you're lying. Go ahead, think about it, have I ever fallen for your lying?"

She paused then sighed "No..."

"So you do like Darry?"

"Yes..."

"Finally! Gosh Naddy you're stubborn enough to give a mule a run for their money and-" he paused and had this look on his face that told her he remembered something. ...And that something wasn't good news.

"Naddy..."

"Yes?"

"Uhh,"

"Just spit it out Dill."

"Ok. Naddy, the king is really strict about his kids. He wants them to marry from one of the other royal familes, as is tradition. It's always been that way, a royal marries a royal,"

Naddy's smile dropped, actually no, her face dropped "Oh.... Has there ever been a royal who didn't?"

"I'm sorry but no...- actually yes! About 20 years ago, Princess Aricia of the Gildea family married an empath named Ethan,"

"Well that's great news! It's been done before! If Darry returned my feelings then we may be able to convince the king and-"

"Naddy! Aricia and Ethan are dead! They died 14 years ago, along with their 3 year old little girl. Gildea remember? I told you about them yesterday, the last royal family, the people's favourite, the family that died out,"

"Oh..."

Author's Note
Hey! How are you finding the book so far? And what do you think of Elle?

Until next time!
-Amy xx