𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒 𝑎 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑒𝑓 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑛𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 | 𝐆𝐈𝐋𝐀𝐍 𝐃𝐀𝐕𝐈𝐃𝐒𝐎𝐍

6 ⋆✶⋆ The Blossoming Fire

"Can I ask you something?" Gilan asked from across the campfire. The flames danced in his eyes when he looked at me nervously.

I ripped my gaze off my bronze oak leaf which I'd gotten yesterday. I really thought I would've failed my tests after I almost hit Crowley during my archery exam.

"Was that not a question already?" I teased him and cocked an eyebrow.

The tall Ranger rolled his eyes, but then continued anyways, after taking a sip from his coffee. "Do you miss your family?"

The smile on my lips immediately melted away like butter on toast. Of course I missed my siblings, but I still didn't like to think about them too much. It hurt too much, and I could never shake the feeling I'd abandoned them. I hated myself for what I'd done, but I couldn't go back.

"Sometimes," I simply said, closing off the topic.

"I'm proud of you," he suddenly blurted out, looking as surprised by it as I did.

"For what?"

"That you chose to stay, even though I could see you had to fight wars to do that that."

Pressure built up in my eyes until it overflowed and the tears started streaming. Shaking my head I buried my face in my hands and started sobbing. I didn't know why it hit me that hard An arm snaked around my back and I was pressed into Gilan's warm chest, I knew from his scent. He always smelled like forest and horse. I wrapped my arms around him and held him tightly. For the first time in a long time I had allowed myself that.

"You weren't supposed to provide for your family, you know that right? Your parents never should've even sent you out to thief in the first place." he whispered in my ear. My heart dropped and I started crying even louder. He was saying the things I'd been waiting to hear all of my life.

I raised my head to look into his eyes, and I was overwhelmed by the amount of love I found in them. The brief moment we stayed like that slowed down, until it seemed like forever. But then the young Ranger pulled away and rested his arms on his knees. It caused such a stab in my chest that I just wanted to die, because that would've been less painful.

With the back of my sleeve I dried my cheeks, even though my aching heart hadn't stopped hurting. "But if something happens to one of them-" my breath stocked, the thought alone was enough to start the waterfall again.

"Then that's not your fault," he placed one hand on my knee and briefly squeezed it, "Your parents should take care of your brothers, not you."

Maybe a part of me deep down knew he was right, but in that moment I just couldn't see it. I would've held myself accountable if one of them died again.

I shook my head. "That's not true. When I was younger I made them a promise, and now I've broken that promise."

"What was the promise?"

"That I would turn things around, give them a better life," I sniffled, "And I've spent years striving to fulfill that promise, but now I've just thrown it away."

"You haven't." he chuckled and I looked at him a bit hurt, because there I was pouring out my heart to him like I hadn't done with anyone and he thought it was funny. "Come on," he looked at me in disbelief, "don't you see that you're keeping that promise? I mean as a Ranger you'll be able to give them way more than you could when you were a thief."

I opened my mouth to object, but then shut it again when I realized I really didn't have a good argument against that anymore.

"And I mean who hasn't made promises as a kid that they would later completely throw out of the window?" he continued, grinning a bit, "I mean I promised my father I'd be the greatest knight Araluen had ever seen."

With a loud snort I responded: "How's that going for you?"

He chuckled and shook his head. "I mean I am a swordsman, but being a Ranger I've always like better than the endless drills at battle school."

"Wait you actually trained with a sword?!" I asked him with a surprised voice.

"Yeah, quite long actually, I mean my dad is sir David so naturally I grew up with a sword in my hands."

"Wait," I held up a hand, "I thought Halt was your dad?"

"No, where'd you get that idea?" he replied with knotted eyebrows.

My mind wandered back to a few days ago, the training field. The older Ranger had been very clear that if I was to ever hurt his former apprentice, I'd be formerly alive. "Well because..." I started, but changed my mind about what I was going to say halfway. "Because the way you guys interact with each other is very much like father and son: the endless slandering and annoyed looks."

"That's not at all how my actual relationship is with my father," Gilan said while staring at the dying flames in front of us, "don't get me wrong, I love him and I know he loves me, but he's always been a bit distant. The only times I'd see him were if I did well in sword-practice or something else 'extraordinary', like he'd call it. Maybe I reminded him too much of my mother, he always said I had her eyes, the same sparkle, or whatever that's supposed to mean."

Without breaking eye contact with the fire, he threw another log on it and continued with a strenuous glint in his eyes. "Not to forget the time I found my mother crying in her room after she'd gotten a letter from one of her friends which told her that my father had been having an affair,"

From the corner of my eye I saw his eyes starting to water. His normally kind and relaxed countenance suddenly became aggressive with his eyebrows in a deep v-shapes and his fire-spitting eyes. I instinctively put a hand on his shoulder and rubbed my thumb over it.

"I'll never forgive him for hurting her like that," he broke of a twig, snapped it in two and threw it into the smouldering logs. We both watched catch fire immediately.

I huffed and grimaced as I turned my head to the boy next to me. "Glad to know I'm not the only one with family issues."

"Yeah, but at least I got a second chance with Halt. We still have to find you a new parental figure." he joked and poked me in the side with his ellbow, though he wasn't smiling.

I snorted. "Yeah, let's go to the market tomorrow, maybe they have some on sale."

Gilan sharply sucked some air through his teeth and answered. "Nah, those will probably be almost a bit too ripe."

Our laughter filled the almost completely silent forest. We continued talking until the fire had completely died out and all of the other Rangers had long gone to bed.