Me again! Same as last time, I don't own any of the characters that you recognise, I just own Lei. Please review if you like this, or even if you don't, feel free to tell me what you think!
Several hours later Lei sat in the middle of her lesson with Tutor, all traces of the morning's laughter forgotten. She had her head on her hand as her mind wandered around the grounds where she could see gardeners tending the summer flowers. It was hot in the study and Lei was struggling to stop herself from falling asleep as Tutor rambled on and on about some spell that she and DG were meant to be learning. She usually loved magic lessons but today Lei just couldn't concentrate. The three princesses had been summoned to court that afternoon to discuss something with their mother and her council. Suddenly a book slammed out of the air in front of Lei's eyes,
"Princess I would appreciate it if you could keep your thoughts inside the room." Lei sighed and tried in vain to concentrate on Toto's face. Ten minutes later and their tutor had given up on teaching the girls anything; none of them seemed to be able to concentrate. DG was doodling on a scrap of parchment, Azkadellia was picking at the edge of the table and Lei was staring out of the window at the gardeners. Toto decided that they should call it a day and let the girls go on the proviso that tomorrow they would have to concentrate and catch up what they had missed.
As Lei wandered out of the room she found her thoughts straying back to Cain, images of him working flashed through her mind causing her to shake her head in an attempt to clear it. She mustn't allow herself to think of him like that. Lei wasn't trying to kid herself, she knew that she was in love with Wyatt Cain.
Lei had been in love with him for the last year, ever since he had saved her from dancing with yet another stuck up nobleman at her and DG's official (if rather late) coming out ceremony. The way it had felt to be held by him made her head spin and this morning when she had found him lying there on her bed her heart had started to pound. It always happened when he got close to her but she knew that he would never feel the same way she did. It infuriated Lei that he was always pointing out how old he was. He wasn't old, fine he was nearly twice her age but she didn't see why that should matter; age was just a number after all. But then maybe that was his way of trying to tell her that he wasn't interested in her like that, 'I'm too old for you Princess.' That was what he had said last time.
It had been about a week ago, they had been in the princess's lounge. Lei had been sitting on the floor leaning against Cain's legs as he sat on the sofa opposite the fire. DG and Glitch had been sharing the other sofa, Azkadellia was in the shower and Raw had gone to bed. Lei remembered the casual way DG had brought up the topic of marriage saying that she was surprised that their parents hadn't set them all up in arranged partnerships. The chat had continued in that vain for a while before Lei had mentioned that if their parents ever tried to get her to agree to an arranged marriage she would either jump off the highest tower or insist upon marrying Cain. She had only been half joking and the reply Cain gave made her want to curl up and die in a corner.
"Don't be silly Princess," he had said, "I'm too old for you." Only DG had noticed the small hurt look on Lei's face. Later she and Azkadellia had crept in to check on their sister and found Lei curled in a ball silently crying into her pillow. They had spent the rest of the night in Lei's bed the three of them curled up like dormice, a comforting little island of strength in Lie's own personal sea of disappointment and sadness.
Lei shook herself back into the real world before the tears could overwhelm her; she stood up straight as she heard footsteps approaching down the passage. Lei began to walk down the corridor as the footsteps came closer, she didn't have anywhere to go but had no intention of being swept up by any members of the council who might decide to find somewhere for her to be. As the footsteps rounded the corner Lei heard a voice calling to her,
"Princess!" The voice was familiar, deep and husky but still friendly. Lei turned and watched as Cain jogged the last few feet towards her, "You weren't trying to get away from me were you kid?" he asked lightly.
"No," she looked up at him coyly from under her lashes, it was at times like these that Cain felt like a teenage boy all over again, his heart began to race and he wanted to pull the young woman into his arms and kiss her senseless. He was jerked back to reality when Lei continued, "I thought you were one of Mother's council and I really don't like talking to them. They always manage to find some depressingly dull job for me or they give me a lecture about my clothes and how I should be a better role model." Lei gave Cain a look that he had come to recognise over the time he had known the young woman. This particular look was the one that Azkadellia referred as look #4- annoyed with a hint of exasperation. Cain didn't like the members of the Queen's council, he thought they were arrogant gits, but he could at least see their point about Leilani's clothes.
She was wearing one of Glitch's old shirts in a pretty pale yellow and a pair of fitted blue jeans. Cain had to admit that whilst the clothes suited Lei, the jeans hugging her petit figure and the yellow of the shirt making her amethyst eyes sparkle even more than normal, they were very much like the clothes DG had described from the other-side. He knew that Lei had always worn the hand-me-downs from the men in the resistance but maybe she should be trying a little harder to fit in with court life. Cain was about to voice this opinion when Lei spoke sending every other thought out of his head.
"So what you up to for the rest of the day?" she asked him. Cain shrugged he was finding it hard to concentrate, all his thoughts were buzzing around inside his head like angry bees. How did this always happen to him, as soon as she spoke her crystalline voice would send him mind into a whirl of disjointed thoughts. "I don't suppose..." she began looking down at her feet.
"What is it Princess?" Lei glared up at him for a moment, he knew that she hated being addressed by her title but Cain had always found calling her by her name difficult and anyway she always called him by his surname and there wasn't that much difference, was there?
"Well Mr Cain," she replied, stressing the title that she knew he hated and giving a half smile as he winced, "I was going to ask if you would consider accompanying me for an afternoon ride, but if your too busy..." She trailed off letting the sentence hang in the air. Cain thought for a moment, he knew that the Princesses had an appointment with the council and he himself was expected to be there and then he had more loathsome paperwork to do, that was one thing he had not missed in the tin suit.
He looked down at the young woman beside him she looked so tired; not the same person he had met two years ago in the back allies of Central City. It was hard to see if you didn't know what to look for, most of the time Lei made a good show of being happy for her parents, but those very close to her could see the difference. There was a little sigh she gave when she looked out at the gardens and then further out over the forests and lakes at Finaqua or the streets of Central City. That sigh said 'once that was my playground, the backdrop of my life. Now I can't step outside without being mobbed.'
Cain relented, he knew that the ride out in the open would do her good; anyway if he didn't go with her she would go without him and then something really bad could happen. She could fall off her horse, or run into rebel long-coats, or get mugged, or... worse... He stopped that thought and looked down at Lei again.
"Alright, but on two conditions: 1) you go to the meeting with the council first and 2) you go to said meeting wearing a proper dress." Lei raised her hands, palms upwards and tipped them as if they were a set of weighing scales and spoke in a slightly amused voice,
"Hmm, an afternoon wearing a horrible, itchy, multi-layered monstrosity of a dress followed by a ride with a slightly sadistic ex-Tin Man. Or no afternoon out and a big argument about my choice of clothes with some puffed up little council member, let me think about this." She linked her arm through his and kicked her feet slightly as she walked.
They continued in a companionable silence for a while before Lei spoke again,
"So, any preference as to which dress I wear?" she had meant it as a joke and was surprised when she got a serious answer.
"That blue one with the, oh you know the... swishy bits." Cain frowned off into the middle distance.
"The blue one with the swishy bits that's really descriptive Cain, really I think you should seriously consider a career as a novelist." Cain gave her a look that would have sent a normal person running for the hills, but Lei just laughed. "Well I'll see you later, I've got to go and find that blue, swishy dress!" She pecked him on the cheek and ran off.
Cain was left staring after her like an adolescent boy. No-one had ever made him feel like that, not since Adora, she had been the only person who had been able to leave him absolutely speechless. Cain removed his hat and ran a hand through his short blonde hair as the memory of his wife made his chest tighten. He sighed, what could he do, this young woman made him feel emotions that he thought had died the day he found Adora's grave but even threw the odd tightening of his chest that Lei induced when she smiled at him he could still feel the pain from the loss of his wife.
He was jerked from his reverie by the sound of a throat being cleared, Cain turned around to find Glitch looking at him with one eyebrow raised,
"You know Cain, you may not be the world's greatest thinker but I thought even you could manage thinking and walking at the same time." Glitch waited for the sarcastic response that was normal but none came, instead the Tin Man mumbled something about horses and hurried off in the wrong direction. Glitch watched him go before heading in the direction of DG's room to tell her about this interesting deterioration of Cain's mental abilities.
Lei was standing in front of her wardrobe with her sisters inspecting the collection of so-called "everyday dresses". They were not nice, whilst all of the Princesses ball gowns were made by the court tailor and were almost always designed by one of the royal trio these dresses were not. They were not bad as dresses went but they were all a little old fashioned- and most of them itched. Lei sighed as she pulled out yet another blue number only to find that it was in no way 'swishy',
"I really wish you would tell us why it is so important that you find the right blue dress to wear this afternoon, it's not anything important, just a meeting with mother's council." Azkadellia said from Lei's right.
"Oh, no reason, I just really felt like wearing this one dress. That's all." Lei sighed again and through the dress onto the ever growing pile on her bedroom floor. DG looked at her older sister with an expression of complete disbelief; Lei had never shown any interest in wearing any of these gowns before. It made her slightly suspicious of her big sister, a feeling she did not like; there was definitely something that Leilani wasn't telling them.
"If you really want to wear it why don't describe it to us and we can help you look." She tried, looking at Azkadellia for encouragement. The eldest Gale sister nodded and made a small noise in assent. Lei gave another non-committal shrug and continued with the disembowelment of her wardrobe.
There was a knock on the door that caused all of the princesses to turn,
"Come in." Called Lei, hoping against hope that it wasn't Cain coming to check on her, she really did not want the Tin Man to find her desperately searching for the dress that he had told her to wear. Her plan of surprising him with just the right outfit would only work if she turned up in it; the allusion would be completely spoiled if he knew just how long it was taking her to find the right one. Her anxieties were quelled however when Glitch entered the room, he opened his mouth to speak but stopped when he saw the contents of the closet scattered on the floor,
"What happened in here? You're not throwing those out are you? Your mother will be devastated, besides you always looked nice in that colour. Although you look better in purple it really brings out your eyes." DG grinned, it was so like there friend to go off at a tangent- not that he was wrong Lei had always looked good in purple she had their mother's gorgeous eyes- but he had probably come with something important to tell them. Azkadellia was the first to answer Glitch's questions,
"No Glitch, Lei was looking for a specific dress and these apparently are not that dress. We were trying to help her but she won't tell us what it looks like." Lei gave another massive sigh and collapsed face first onto her bed,
"I would tell you but I don't know! All I know is that it's blue and swishy!" Lei mumbled from her strike position on the bed. Glitch looked at her,
"If you don't know what it looks like then why do you want to wear it?" He asked sceptically. The response he got sounded more like 'mumble mumble mumble' than an actual answer.
"Sorry," Glitch said moving closer to the bed, "didn't quite catch that." Leilani rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling as she spoke,
"I said, because Cain suggested it." Her three companions stared at her for a long moment until she sat up and gave them all a defiant look, her cheeks glowing a rich, rosy pink. A sudden look of surprise crossed Glitch's face.
"Was it you who was talking to him about ten minutes ago?" Leilani nodded, "What did you say to him, he was standing there like you had taken your top off!" Glitch exclaimed.
"I didn't do THAT!" Lei cried her cheeks turning an even deeper shade of cherry red, "I didn't do anything, I just said goodbye and told him I was going to come here and find the dress." Azkadellia and DG exchanged glances,
"Well now," Azkadellia said, breaking the slightly awkward silence as every puzzled over the conundrum that was commonly known as Wyatt Cain, "let's get you into that swishy dress before we are late for the meeting."
I hope you enjoyed it, please review!
Igor xx
