Adventures of the Lightborn Squad

Chapter 2: The Vagrant Poet

When daylight broke, the lady rummaged through the brigands' belongings, and found a long white shirt, and a pair of dark brown pants. It would have to do for now. The men's clothing were obviously way too large for her: the shirt hung off her thin frame, and she needed to use some rope as a makeshift belt to keep the pants up.

At least she didn't have to wear her torn dress, she thought, looking at the pale blue dress she had to discard. Granger had been polite enough to leave the room whilst she dressed, but he had returned now, obviously eager to get going.

Princess Silvanna (it's Emma for now, she reminded herself, she mustn't blow her cover) also managed to find a spare set of clothes and a travelling cloak that fell all the way to her feet.

Everything else was useless to her but digging around, she finally uncovered a pair of sharp knives, to her delight. 'Emma' hated that she didn't have her trusty lance with her, but at least now she had some kind of weapon.

While Granger readied the horses and cart left behind by the brigands (and packed everything they needed to travel as well as the gold), Silvanna hunted for a long stick to sharpen into a makeshift spear. It would have to do, until she got back to her home.

Also, it would be a small deterrent against her sullen guide in case he suddenly turned on her. She didn't think he would, but years of training and political backstabbing put her on edge. She glanced at him.

While he was alright last night, he had been completely silent the whole day, preferring to communicate with grunts and nods rather than actual conversation, if he could. Silvanna had tried to keep up a steady stream of conversation, but it very quickly became completely one-sided on her end.

All that she knew of him was that he was a marksman, he was very quiet, and he had a guitar case. And he had a scar over his left eye. She wondered where he got it from.

Conversation halted, her mind wandered towards the last few days. The last thing she had remembered was being present at a court in session, before she felt dizzy. Everything faded to dark. She could barely recall the days after that, just flashes of blur where she was force fed a drink that made her drowsy again.

She had been kidnapped right in front of a full court, for Lord's sake. Something foul was at play here. She ran through her mind a list of people who could have potentially been involved. Unfortunately, she came up with nothing.

Other than her father King Aurelius II and her mother, there was only one person she felt she could trust. Tigreal. The Imperial Capital's Moniyan Captain of Knights. After years of being an Imperial Knightess and working closely with this man, she knew this was the one person she could put her trust in. Once she gets back to the Moniyan Empire, she must get in touch with him.

***

Her hair was purple. Granger had thought that it was the trick of the light, but in the sun, he could see that Emma's long hair was indeed a shade of purple-blonde. He'd tried not to stare, but it was kind of hard not to when her hair was freaking purple.

No no, no. He wouldn't spare any more thoughts of this girl. Once he had deposited her in Mossenia and collected his reward, he would be on his way and that would be it.

Granger tried to think about anything else. Demons, the Monastery, his guns, the trees.

I was right, her eyes are grey, Granger mused absentmindedly to himself.

Fuck.

***

Night had fallen before they finally stopped to rest. Silvanna stretched her legs and attended to the horses while Granger set about in making a fire. The fish they had caught from a nearby river lay glistening on the ground.

They had gone almost the whole day without talking (well Silvanna talked and Granger listened) and it was about to drive Silvanna mad. She wondered why he chose this vagrant life.

"Do you play?" She gestured to the guitar case, desperate now for conversation. To her surprise, Granger's face lit up. This was the happiest she had ever seen him so far.

"A little." He shrugged. Silvanna wasn't about to let him get away with it.

"Well, I'd love to hear!"

"Really?" He gazed at her. She nodded. "Alright," he conceded, his finger already unsnapping the case open.

To her surprise, he took out a violin. She was expecting a guitar from the guitar case. But hey, who was complaining?

She sat back, as he plucked the strings lightly and twiddled the knobs. Then he played a mournful melody, one she recognised as a sonata about an ill-fated opera singer who fell in love with the daughter of an Earl. They could never be together in Life, but they found each other in Death.

Silvanna listened, open-mouthed. He was dreadful.

"You're terrible," the words escaped from her mouth before she could stop it.

"I know," he said.

"Where did you learn?" she asks.

"Books," he shrugs.

"Why do you keep a violin in a guitar case?"

Granger sullenly snaps the case shut. "It was a gift. From someone special."

He was back to his closed off self again, so she found herself rambling. "I've loved music since I was a child. I'd sit for hours listening to my mother playing the piano. She tried to teach me but I guess I wasn't too good at it. I much preferred to listen to her."

Granger nodded in agreement. "Music calms me down."

He thinks for a moment before adding, "Plus, when demons are suffering from my music, they'll get so wrapped up in it that they don't even notice my bullets until it's too late."

Silvanna stares open-mouthed, before she starts laughing uncontrollably. Demons getting distracted and losing focus because of lousy music before they get killed? Now that was an idea so hilarious, it might just work. Maybe she should actually run it past Tigreal?

Lord of light, it feels good to laugh like this again, without worrying about what other people might think of her.

***

Perhaps it wasn't such a bad idea to take on this mission after all, Granger thinks to himself.

He thinks the same thing a few minutes later when Emma laughs when a supposedly dead fish jumped from her grasp when she was trying to cook it, and she doesn't miss the slight upturn of his lips.

***