Love is a strange thing…

Since before the dawn of time, it has been the driving force of unity between all beings; starting with simple Platonism that could unite all, as was the case with the citizens of Elibe with the races of dragons and humans that lived in harmony with one another upon the mystical continent.

But of course, there was also the intimacy between two who wished to be together for the rest of their lives, which was what the King Hartmut felt as he held out a silver ring that practically glittered in the light, out to the Divine Dragon Idenn. As she saw the small ringlet in front of her, her eyes instantly widened as a small gasp escaped from her mouth before both of her hands covered it immediately. However, as only a few seconds had passed, Idenn had lowered her hands, revealing a gentle smile accompanied by tiny cascades running across her cheeks, and then, a slow nod of her head, with an extension of her right hand out to him.

Hartmut, as if in synchronization, smiled right back at her, and took a gentle hold of her hand, slipping the ring on with the utmost care. Once it was secured and fit, the two instantly fell into a tender embrace, ready to spend the rest of their days together in absolute bliss.

If only life was that merciful…

As the flames of war spread across all of Elibe, shattering the peace between humans and dragons that was once forged as strong as steel, Idenn struggled and fought as she was strapped to a stone slab one might call a table. From the corner of her eye, she could see her lifelong friend Jahn, gripping onto her Divinestone. As Idenn pleaded with every breath she had for him to cease this lunacy and set her free, Jahn's only returning look was a sharp glare to the side, especially on the wedding ring she now bore on her hand. The Fire Dragon scoffed out a puff, shutting his eyes in bitter disgust, and swiftly turned his back to her as he began leaving the room. Idenn's wails for help grew even more as she saw Jahn leave her, but also by another tenfold as her sight of him was blocked by the sight of a foreboding Shaman hovering above her. Placing a hand with the boniest of what could be called fingers across her entire head, with fingernails as black as a raven and sharp as its talons already digging into her scalp.

Jahn continued walking as the preparation for the removal was underway, ignoring the shrill screams and cries as if he was deaf. In his hand, the Divinestone grew a small array of cracks within it as Jahn's knuckles began to whiten, and the bones in his hand appearing from underneath his skin.

The air soon echoed a deafening shattering, as the ground was lightly covered in bright dust.

In the light of the various torches set all around, the sparkling reflections off of the remaining grains appeared just the same as those that reflected off of teardrops…

"Ideeennn~! Guess what day it finally is!" The tiny Divine Dragon known as Fae cheerily said aloud as she was already airborne with a pair of fluffy wings to Idenn, who was simply sitting down by the table in their dining room, complete with a classic tilt of the head in confusion to Fae's remark.

"…Isn't it Tuesday? In the morning?" Idenn replied to the youthful kin of a dragon, automatically ending everything she was saying with a question mark.

Fae however, let out a groan to Idenn's response. "No Idenn, it's your biwthday today!" She spoke out to the confounded Divine Dragon as her cheeks pouted out with her wings ruffled up. "C'mooon Idenn, Fae's not the smartest dwagon out there, but even she wemembers her own biwthday!"

"O-oh! I see…" Idenn's face had looked doused with pink from that, and her now forlorn gaze soon met the ground as her shoulders slumped. "I-I'm sorry Fae… I should be able to know the day I was birthed, but I…" Her fingers gently pressed up against her forehead as her eyes grew even more saddening.

"Oh… Idenn…" Fae muttered out in sympathy as her pout had quickly disappeared as she saw Idenn's change in expression. A mere millisecond later though, she wrapped her arms, and even one feathered wing, right around Idenn in a tender hug as a small smile now grew on her face. "It's okay. Fae knows you still can't wemember much. That's why Fae's here to help you after all!" Fae told her as she smothered her face into Idenn's.

Despite the lack of personal space at the moment, Idenn couldn't help but smile. It had been far too long since she had such sweet companionship as Fae, or even the emotions to comprehend it after her soul had been removed in the Scouring. If it hadn't been for the young Pheraen known as Roy and his comrades, she would've still remained no more than a puppet that lived only to fuel the fires of war.

"Well anyway, since it's your biwthday…" Fae said in growing glee as she let go of Idenn, with the smile on her face growing even wider. "Fae thinks it's finally the time to show you this!" The young dragon then immediately put a hand in her parcel, causing Idenn to have a look of curiosity on her face. "Ta-dah!" Fae pulled out what appeared to be a very old and worn out box, with the wood nearly black and the metal rusted, and placed it on the table right in front of Idenn. "Fae found this in that old stinky castle you were in until Woy saved you." She told her with peppiness in her tone, even moreso than usual. "Fae had been cuwious about what was in it, but since it was with you for centuwies, Fae figured you should have what's inside it."

Idenn looked at Fae with some surprise emanating from her, and then at the box with perplexity. Even though she was sealed within the Dragon Temple for nearly 1000 years just as Fae proclaimed, this was the first time she ever laid eyes upon the wooden container, and it didn't even look familiar to her either. She put a few fingers on the rusted lock on the front in an attempt to open it, but just found herself grunting and hurting her fingers for a few seconds instead.

"Oh! Wight!" Fae immediately stood up in her seat a bit as her wings slightly stretched up, and reached a hand out to the rusty lock before flicking it clean off with just her fingers, an action that definitely couldn't be performed by human hands. "Sowwy Idenn, Fae keeps fowgetting that you're still getting your stwength back." Fae said to her with a soft tone within her voice and her smile.

"Oh, it's alright Fae, thank you." Idenn smiled a little bit back in gratitude. As she saw the little one beam at back at her in response, Idenn now took a hold of the top part of the box, and managed to take it off with surprising ease given the container's age. As the box fully opened up, small bits of dust had flown all around like tiny gnats, causing a coughing fit from Fae as her wings quickly went to work trying to blow it away. Once the dust was taken care of to relax Fae, Idenn took a glimpse inside what the box was also containing, and had seen a piece of paper that appeared to be ready to crumple into dust at any second, and a tiny black box tucked neatly into the corner.

Idenn softly pinched the corners of the paper as she lifted it from the box, squinting her eyes to see what had been written on it.

'Id…

…sor…

…giv …

lea… sea…

…ive…

Hart…'

That was all Idenn could piece out on the paper, with the rest of the ink washed away by the long courses of time it went through. But despite the words being indecipherable now, the glimpses of what handwriting had remained striked a shock to Idenn. She couldn't remember whose handwriting it was, nor had she even known almost anyone's touch with the pen on paper, but she couldn't deny the feeling of what humans had nicknamed 'butterflies in the stomach' as she noticed it.

"Idenn? You okay?" Fae asked riddled with worry, causing a few surprised blinks and a look back from Idenn, who saw Fae leaning in a touch with a face coated with concern from seeing her look at the shriveled piece of paper for so long.

Idenn simply nodded back as her face mimicked the action of a smile to ease Fae. "You can relax Fae, I'm alright." As soon as she told that to Fae however, her eyes traced right back to the paper, reading over the only visible sets of letters again, and causing a pout from the petite dragon. Fae glazed her eyes back into the box, noticing the small black one that was put into place within the corner. With a delicate touch, Fae carefully removed the tiny box from the withered container and held it out to Idenn.

"Wanna open this now Idenn?" Fae held the box right up to Idenn's face, smiling innocently all the while, especially when the recovering Divine Dragon looked back at both her and the box with perplexed eyes. Once her eyes landed and stayed on the black box with curiosity, Fae put it right into her hand with her cheerful grin not fading an inch, and Idenn could already feel as if her hands were moving on instinct as they prepared to open up the box, before immediately doing so.

Idenn let out a quiet gasp at the sight of the containments. Inside it, there was no more than a small ring, made purely out of silver that somehow escaped the fate of rusting that the rest of the metal had fell victim to. It even still shimmered in the sunlight that hit it through the open windows, like one of the countless stars in the night sky.

"Pwetty~" Fae couldn't resist letting that out as she saw the ring sparkle in the sun as well.

Idenn was still astonished by how the small ringlet hadn't appeared to age a day, and without a second's notice, gently slipped it onto her ring finger, where it fit right into place on her right hand. Idenn let in a shaky breath as a response; not to how well the piece of jewelry fit on her finger, but how familiar the sensation of having it on felt to her. There was an indescribable comfort that coursed through her veins as she could faintly feel her blood traveling within them from having the ring on, a comfort that was similar to being draped in the inviting arms of a loving family member. She currently couldn't remember anything about where she had last seen the ring, or why it gave her this 'feeling' at all, but the emotions that started to emerge from her couldn't be denied. She knew that all too well…

"Hooway! It's a pewfect fit!" Fae threw her arms straight up into the air as her wings stretched right back out, which were now almost as long as the table itself. "Isn't it gweat th-Huh? …Idenn?" Fae's small celebration was immediately put to a halt once she had seen Idenn's head slightly drooped down, accompanied by the hand with the ring on it curled as if it was going into a fist, and the most concerning of all to her, the silent tears that cascaded across her face, dripping right onto her palm. Even when Idenn slightly turned her head to Fae's direction in response, her expression was frozen on her entire body.

Fae flew up from her seat, lifting her wings as gently as she could, and lifted a tiny hand wipe off a few of the tears flowing from Idenn's eyes. "You're cwying…" She nearly whispered out in a somber voice, causing Idenn's damp eyes to widen, and raise her hand to her face, feeling the tears on her face as they now traveled down her fingers as well. Upon this notice, more tears had seemed to well up from her eyes now.

"Oh gods, pwease don't cwy Idenn! Fae's sowwy she made you start cwying!" Fae exclaimed in a feather-ruffling panic as she noticed the extra array of droplets on Idenn's face. "Do you hate the pwetty wing that was in that tiny box? Fae's sowwy Idenn, Fae'll put the bad wing away now." She reached out a hand to Idenn's to slip the ring off of her finger, in the hopes that it would calm her back down and cease her tears.

When Idenn saw Fae's hand reach out to take away her ring though, she instantly pulled her hand away from grasp to keep it away from reach, her face now etched with terrified eyes alongside the teardrops that leaked out of them.

In response, Fae flinched back a bit herself, taken aback by Idenn's sudden defensiveness. "Idenn? What's the pwoblem? You're acting stwangely again…" She asked out to her in a more gentle tone now, in the hopes of keeping her from acting sporadically like she had once she placed the ring on herself. But despite Fae's outer attempt at staying calm though, she felt like her whole body was filled to the brim with panicked butterflies right now, with Idenn's continued silence and streams of tears definitely not helping.

*knock knock*

Both Fae and Idenn's ears immediately perked up at the sound of knocking right outside the door to their house, with the former's ears standing straight up as her wings did the same.

"Hello? Fae? Idenn? You two home?" Said an all too familiar voice to both of the dragons, causing not only a set of stunned gasps from both of them, but a brightening of the eyes, widening of a smile from pointy ear to pointy ear, and a jump right into a state of airborne for one.

"Woy's here! Woy's here!" Fae shouted out in sheer joy as she classically zipped right through the dining room and the house that stood by it and the door, and causing a crash that even Idenn could hear, along with an array of struggling and complaints that were no doubt from Roy being tackled by Fae once again, like she had done before on every occasion that the Young Lion traveled to the remote land of Arcadia to check up on Idenn.

Upon seeing Roy enter the house and room with Fae right next to him, already airborne again, Idenn had a small look of shock before wiping off the tears that still remained on her face to keep Roy from seeing them.

"Hello again, Lord Roy…" Idenn nodded with a wavering smile quickly plastered on her face, as her hand folded on her lap with one on the other, covering her ring.

"Hey! No fair!" Fae lashed out suddenly with a pout and a pair of wings practically conjuring a tiny tornado. "You were cwying a second ago and wiped away your tears to keep Woy f-" Before Fae could finish what she was proclaiming though, she was quickly silenced by a small smack behind the noggin from their own visitor.

"Uh uh uh, remember Fae, politeness." Roy told her in the standard prim and proper parent style complete with a wag of his finger, causing Fae to let out a 'hmph' as she returned to standing on the ground, with her pout still remaining. As the Lord let out a chuckle in response to Fae's crassness, he then walked up to Idenn's side, crouching down a bit as he softly smiled to her already.

"Hello there, birthday girl." Roy told her cheerfully, complete with a chuckle as he witnessed Idenn's face flush in response to that. "Haha, don't worry Idenn, I only know that because of Fae and all of the pleading requests she's given me to see you on this certain day." He reassured her with a gentle pat on her shoulder, and his smile growing a bit wider. "But she had also told me that you were suddenly tearing up when you put on one of your birthday gifts." While Roy's tone grew softer and quitter, he also lowered his hand to gently rub her back for some additional comfort. "Idenn, is something wrong?"

"I…" Idenn felt her throat close up and twist into knots as she tried to speak. "I don't know…" She could then feel her entire body tremble as it started to shake, growing worse with every second, and also clutching the area above her heart with both of her hands, revealing the ring she now wore. "I know… I know it's something special, but…" As her words became harder to muster out of her mouth, the tears from her eyes became easier to leak from her eyes once again. "I…can't… I can't…remember…"

"Idenn…" Roy could feel his own eyes growing a sting within them as he saw the recovering Divine Dragon in this state. Sympathy was an emotion that struck the young Lordling all too often, especially whenever he had come to visit Idenn for a checkup on her condition after the war against Bern. Even without hearing a full confirmation of what Idenn meant to say when her voice had dried up more with every attempt she made to explain herself, he could just sense what she was emanating right now. Her anguish, her confusion, her frustration, her loneliness…

Within a single second, Roy gently placed his other hand on Idenn's own, that were above her heart, immediately causing her damp eyes to widen as she looked back at him.

"I'm sorry that you had to go through all of this…" Roy softly told her with eyes of honesty, before they soon brightened again, with his gentle smile returning. "But you don't have to worry anymore Idenn. You're not alone in this anymore, and you have your life back." Despite the young lord's willpower to look positive, his own eyes had also soon grown damp, just as Idenn's did. "So… stay happy, okay Idenn?"

"Stay happy…" Idenn repeated to herself, watching Roy nod in response, while also smiling even moreso, and more happily. All the while, feeling the warmth that emanated from his hands as one rested on her back, and the other on her own two hands, until, in a bit of time, a smile had found its way onto her face as well, and a sense of ease had come to her in this moment.

"Awww, such a cute couple~!" Fae blurted out as she watched the two smiled back at one another, having still been in the room as the two interacted with one another. The instant reaction was a maddening blush that coated both Roy and Idenn's faces alongside their expressions of complete surprise, and Roy immediately standing stiffly back up to recover some personal space.

"Fae!" Roy yelled out in a flustered state to the tiniest dragon in the room. "D-don't say stuff like that about people just because you see them being next to each other! Especially when you burst it right out like that!" But despite Roy's loud and aggravated tone, the stuttering in his voice combined with the red beet for a face he currently possessed made Fae fall to the ground from laughing so hard rather than intimidation, causing a frustrated groan from the Young Lion.

Idenn however, while just as shocked and embarrassed as Roy from Fae's sudden comment like that, witnessing the sight of Fae laughing as she rolled around on the ground seemed to spark something of a…bubbly feeling within her, as Fae's laughter seemed to become all the more contagious. As a result, she couldn't help but start laughing herself, instantly surprising both Roy and Fae.

"She…she's happy again!" Fae exclaimed in sheer joy now, even expanding her wings a tad until she hugged Roy, with a bit of a tackle as well. "Oh thank you, thank you, thank you for cheewing her up Woy!"

Roy 'oofed' in response to Fae knocking some air out of him, but he soon found himself smiling again himself, and even returning the hug a bit. "Haha, you're welcome then Fae."

Idenn soon quieted her laughing, but she still continued smiling, just enjoying the company she found in both Roy and Fae, and remembering the reassurance that she wasn't alone now. Though the familiarity of the ring was still ambiguous to her, she still felt an undeniable sense of comfort from wearing it now, and that was what was important right now, just as Roy said from speaking of staying happy.

For even if one cannot fully comprehend it, they can still sense it within them.

Love is a strange thing indeed…