Vara

Chapter 10

Vara woke up, groaning loudly but did not move from her spot on the bed. Her muscles were burning. She couldn't even twitch a finger without being in pain. She could only imagine what the poor princess was feeling - that kid had never been through any rigorous exercise, running through a forest to escape rebels would be hard on anyone who had muscles as soft as marshmallows.

It was dark in her room from the lack of windows, but since they had left her door open, sunlight flooded in from the prince's room into hers, giving at least part of her room some light for her to see.  Inhaling slowly, filling her chest with as much air as she could, she slowly sat up, little whines of pain escaping her throat no matter how much she tried to hide it. Unfortunately, it disturbed the one person she didn't want to disturb.

"I thought you were never going to wake up." Jorik sighed heavily. His body was out of view, but she knew he was somewhere right outside her door. "I'm sorry," she gasped, leaning her back against the wooden headboard. Her eyes teared up a little bit from the pain in her arms and core. Any muscle that she used to sit up burned. Jorik finally stepped into her room, just far enough to toss a small parcel onto her bed. 

"What is this?" her eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"You can't serve me in your nightclothes, so I had these specially made for you," he stated, shrugging before turning and lighting a few candles in her room. "I'm going to close the door so that you can get dressed. Don't take too long, or we'll both miss breakfast," he warned, leaving the small bedroom and closing the door behind him. 

Vara slowly peeled off her nightshirt, wincing in pain as her muscles screamed in protest. Still sitting on the bed, she set her shirt on the end of the bed and opened the parcel, pulling out the undershirt first and slipping it over her head, letting out a small whine when the muscles on her sides stretched with each movement.

Next came the short-sleeved light blue shirt; she slipped it on, one arm then another, like one would pull on a jacket. She took the short string on the front end of the right side and pulled it to the short string connected to the shirt's left seam, tying them off. Then did the same with the left side, tying it to the right, the panels on the front of the shirt crossing the other. Vara sighed at the part that came next, pulling out a dark blue skirt from the package and inspected it. It looked like a normal skirt, but she found that they were just very wide-legged pants upon closer inspection. A huge grin slowly crept onto her face, the girl ignoring the pain of her muscles as she hopped off the bed, stumbling and tugging them on, the bottoms nearly touching the ground.

"That old lady really outdid herself this time," Vara mumbled to herself, pulling the waistband of the not-skirt over her shirt, stopping it just under her bust. There was a light blue sash, the same color as her shirt, coiled in the package as well, which she used to tie and secure around her waist, letting the extra ends of the string dangle. She could feel that she was wearing pants, but when she looked down, all she saw was a skirt. She was definitely happy with this.

Two items remained in the package: The shoes, which were plain black flats. She pulled them out, tossing them onto the floor in front of her, and slipped them on easily. The back of the shoes hurt - breaking them in would definitely cause her pain, but she would worry about that later.

The last item was the robe. It was dark blue, just like her bottoms. The bottom of the robe stopped only a few inches from the ground. It had long, wide sleeves, the front of the robe had a wide collar that went from top to bottom unbroken, embroidered with light pink flowers with medium to dark green leaves.

Vara looked down and inspected the outfit for a minute before letting out a pained sigh, slowly stumbling out of her room to see Prince Jorik already dressed, the male wearing a mostly dark blue outfit himself. "Aw, I did not realize you wanted to match." she snorted, giving a smirk when she saw his face flush. "This was already laid out for me; I did not pick it," he replied curtly, crossing his arms and glancing her over. "Wow, I really can't tell that you're wearing pants... at least no one can complain that you aren't wearing 'girly' things."

Vara nodded, reaching up and undoing the braid in her hair. "What was that face?" he asked when Vara winced from raising her arms. "It's nothing, your highness; my body still hurt from the... adventure yesterday." she sighed, pulling the top half of her hair in a simple bun. The Prince just watched, presumably out of curiosity. "Are you not going to decorate your hair?"

"Your highness, up until yesterday, I was a slave. I do not own anything to put in my hair besides this single hair tie." Vara wasn't trying to be terse, but it was slightly annoying how she always had to remind him that she had nothing of her own, besides the clothes on her back and that wretched magic collar. "Speaking of which," Jorik hummed, glancing down at the ring at her neck.

"After breakfast, I will speak with the blacksmith about getting that off your neck. You're my servant, so you don't need it any longer."

"Servants are people who have magic, your highness. I do not have any - making me your servant does not mean that they will allow this collar to come off." Vara sighed, making her master snort. "And I am the prince of Astaeli. If I do not want my maid to wear a collar meant for slaves, I will have my way," he replied evenly, crossing his arms and giving a look that said there would be no room for argument.

Vara stared at him for a long minute. "Can you explain yourself now, by the way, since we're on the topic of magic?" she asked. "We aren't in my study yet, are we? Later today, I promise." He spoke, already turning to leave the room. "How can I trust that you'll keep your word on that?" she watched him pause in the doorway, the male glancing over his shoulder to look at her. "Well, I've trusted you to not blab about what I can do, so I suppose you'll just have to trust that I will answer your questions later."