Janus woke to the brilliance of the sun's rays blasting him full in the face as someone in the room jerked the curtains open. A hand immediately rose to shield his eyes as he creaked them open to glance at the person at the window. After a bit of mumbling, he managed to formulate a few words. "Um… Schala, is that you?" He couldn't make out but a silhouette in the brightness that filled his bed chamber.
The figure turned to him and he was rewarded with the familiar sight of his sister's face wrinkled with worry. He really wished she wouldn't make such expressions all the time, convinced that it would permanently affect her fine features. Yet he brushed off his silent musings and smiled in greeting.
"Morning," he managed to voice more clearly.
Schala didn't respond right away, which bothered him since she was always so quick to answer anyone, more so especially for her younger brother. Her brow remained furrowed as she regarded him, her luminous violet eyes narrowed seemingly with pain. She took her time in eventually broadcasting what must have been bothering her. "What were you doing out of your room so late last night?"
Janus tried his best to not outwardly react to her words. How had she known?
"He was trying not to work me into a panic, I know he was."
Her brother blinked in confusion.
"I woke because I heard someone rustling around and thought it was just Mother coming in late from another drinking bout, so I got out of bed thinking to say goodnight. But instead there were attendants scurrying in and out of your chamber saying you had been out of your room and had been found sick in the royal guest chambers! Janus, you know how much I worry about you already. Please, don't keep scaring me like this. I don't think I could take very much of it if you did."
"But I'm alright, Schala. I feel fine," the prince protested ineffectively. He knew his words would never cease his sister's constant worries. "I was just wanting some company and you were already fast asleep."
"Then how did you become sick?" she demanded, all the while keeping her tone light.
Janus paused to ponder the previous night's events, again feeling a horrible wrenching in his stomach as the reminder of Lavos hit him hard. He decided it best to hide the truth since it would only reinforce Schala's misgivings. "I was just thinking too much that I ended up overwhelming myself."
"About what?" Her eyes locked fixedly onto his.
But then again, some truth might not hurt when it was already general knowledge. "About Mother having changed so much."
Schala was fighting back tears now. "But they said you had actually fainted!"
"Who did?"
"Everyone who knew what had happened last night. Apparently…" She trailed off as her mind continued to wander for her. "I'm going to find out what really happened!" she suddenly stated in resolution. "Maybe Prophet will tell me. He was the first one to alert anybody." She bounced off the edge of the mattress where she had settled and disappeared with a flash of her richly flowing cerulean hair.
Janus stared horrorstruck at the open doorway from which his sister had just left. Surely Prophet wouldn't mention anything relevantly secret between the two of them? Just the tiniest mention that the prince was having nightmares would send Schala off the edge.
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"Toast, your Majesty?" an attendant inquired at the queen's elbow.
The monarch waved a hand dismissively at the sliced loaf on the platter that the girl held. The waitress lowered her face in acknowledgement and briskly trotted back into the kitchens. With her face resting in a hand propped against the table by her elbow and the other tracing fingers around the rim of her empty breakfast glass, Alvira Zeal was slowly idling away the morning hours lost in thought. Her eyes were fixed upon her chalice unseeingly until the twin iron doors suddenly swung open with resounding echoes as they banged back against the walls.
Startled, she narrowed her eyes accusingly at the disruptor. "Quell that anger of yours so early in the morning! Act like you truly have the dignity that your position retains!" She glared down upon the general commander in the likeliness that she was readying to squash him like a cockroach.
"Your Majesty, control that beast of yours before he works the Priesthood into a panicked frenzy! He's scaring them with some rubbish late-night story of his own creation. They're dragging along at his heels screaming, 'Oh, Merciful Entity save you!'"
"Beast? …oh, you mean him." She worked around the bark of sarcasm that she was urging to release. "Surely he's just bored."
"You allow that devil to express his boredom in such a manner? He'll have the entire kingdom sparking unnecessary rumors before the day is through!"
"Now, now, Dalton. Temper your spirits, why don't you? Wine?" She reached across her cleaned plate for a half-empty glass bottle.
"Majesty, I think you should really not avoid the situation currently at hand. He's your own child, for Entity's sake!" The man was steaming with frustration that he did not hold his own influence over the boy, otherwise he would have readily broken the child down like one of his novice soldiers. "I implore of you, teach him some proper manners if he is to one day wear the crown himself."
The queen wore a menacing, half-crooked smile as the colonel took his leave with another abusing of the twin doors. "That's my son," she whispered slowly to herself with glee. "Doing what he should at his age. So long as he works Dalton into a sound fit, amusement will never fade from this day to day life."
