Confused
Chapter 1Nealan of Queenscove sat by himself in the stables one night thinking about his life. Somewhere along the line it had gotten ruined, well maybe not ruined but messed up pretty badly. Oh yes that was it, the day there was an attempted assassination on Shinko, the queen. Yuki had been at the palace that fateful day last midwinter and had fought the assassins, she saved the queen but paid for it with her life. That was the day Neal had lost the only person he truly loved (at least at the time he thought so). This isn't right, I'm 35, unmarried, a widower, and at the moment, utterly alone.
"Neal?" A voice called. "Neal are you here? The servants said you were in here."
Damn them, he thought furiously how dare they tell someone where I am when I am like this. "Yeah, I'm here."
"Oh good. You don't mind if I stay the night here do you?" The voice asked.
Neal stiffened, he knew that voice, that was the voice of one of his best friends, Keladry of Mindelan. 'Gods, I don't want her to see me like this, she probably has enough problems of her own.' "No, I don't mind Kel. Say listen I'll talk to you in a few minutes in my rooms alright?"
"Sure, See you then." As she walked away Neal could hear her muttering to herself "Now to find his rooms."
When Neal could no longer hear her footsteps, or her muttering, he venture out of the stall he had been in and looked around to be sure nobody was around. Seeing no one, he headed at a very fast pace for his rooms to clean up.
Late that night, Kel and Neal were still up talking. "Say Neal, what was wrong earlier? You didn't sound like your usual self."
"Oh nothing. I just thinking about Yuki, I really miss her."
"I know, I do too," Kel reassured him and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. "Do you want to talk about anything? I do have experience with this type of thing you know."
Neal grinned "Not right now, we still have cheerful things to talk about. I heard you muttering about not coming here enough. You're right about that you know, you don't come round here enough, how long has it been seen you were last at Queenscove?"
"Hmmm…. That may take some thinking. Goodness it must be almost a year now."
"Don't let it be that long until I see you again after you leave." He ordered her sternly.
Kel grinned sheepishly, "I promise I won't stay away too long. By the by, how are your sons. I believe one is sensible enough to have gone to the university to be a healer."
"They were fine last I heard, they don't write much though. Mokato is smarter than me, he's 15 and still at the university, but Col, he's crazy enough to want to be a knight."
"He's about a second or third year by now right?"
"Fourth, he'll be a squire soon."
"Then I think I just might go and snatch him as my squire before anyone else does…with your permission of course."
"I'd like that, and you also have my permission to be dreadful to him, as my lovely knight mistress was to me." they both laughed outright at that.
"Well my friend, I believe I should like to sleep now, I've a long day ahead of me."
"Kel won't you stay at least one more day, I know you aren't on business or you wouldn't have stopped."
"You know me so well. I would love to stay another day, and now would you kindly escort me to my rooms?"
"Shoot, I forgot to tell anyone to make a
room for you, I guess if you want you could stay with me."
Kel blushed "I don't mind
waiting." She made the mistake of
accidentally letting out a huge yawn in front of him.
"No you won't wait. C'mon I've a nice big, warm bed and no one to share it with" Kel's blush only deepened. "Not like that silly."
"Oh good I know how you've wanted to bed me all these years." She remarked sarcastically trying to cover up her embarrassment with a joke.
"Yeah that's exactly it young lady." He drawled and kissed her cheek. "Now I order you to go to bed before you fall over sitting down."
"Yes mother." Kel said sleepily as she went in to the dressing room to change before crawling into bed. "Sweet dreams Neal."