Ah, one more chapter that doesn't really have much to add to the plot. Ah well, I just felt like writing this. In any case, this will probably be the last chapter for a long time that will be like this. Important stuff comes next :) so brace yourselves for it

"This is where we'll stop for the night," Valek announced, placing his pack roughly on the ground and sitting.

I raised an eyebrow. "No trees for shelter, only you and the hard, cold ground?"

He began to shake out his cloak, getting ready for the night. "This is the way that we were meant to sleep, not on excessively cushy pink pillows." He made a face and I laughed, remembering the inn in the border of the Featherstone Clan's lands. Even the exterior of the building had been bright pink and the inside consisted of many cushions made of the same color. The beds had been so soft that when I dropped into one, I had nearly sank to floor level. Valek, being an assassin, was probably not used to all that pink and had been very quiet that evening despite my teasing.

He lay down his cloak and placed his arms behind his head, propping it up. His gaze drifted skywards and lingered there for what seemed to be an eternity.

"What are you looking at?" I asked, cautiously.

"The stars." I waited, but he apparently wasn't going to say anything more.

"May I also come and watch?" I asked after a moment, slightly bashfully.

"Of course." Without warning, he leaned up on an elbow and with one swift yank, I was down next to him. I yelped in surprise.

Slowly, I lay down as far away from him as I could without rolling off his cloak. I noticed that it had a pleasant, musky scent, just like Valek. Since when did I start noticing what he smelled like? Taking a deep breath, I directed my gaze upwards like him and we admired in companionable silence for a few minutes.

The sparkles of white stars filled the night sky like Illias starflowers in a meadow. Which meadow, I could not remember. There was an unerring sense of deja vous, also with me lying next to someone as they pointed out the stars and told me their stories. Was it a family member? A good friend?

I must have made some kind of sound, because Valek turned his head to look at me quizzically. "I remember something," I explained.

He made an impatient noise when I stopped talking. "You remembered what?"

"Looking up at the night stars in an open field with the wind gently drifting past. I still don't know who I was with though. All I know was that they were teaching me about...constellations? And all the stories that came with them."

"Constellations? I know a few." He pointed to a cluster of stars to our left. "That's the Great Snow Cat and that," he pointed above us ," is Geyr the Hunter. I know a few others but they've slipped my mind for the moment."

I frowned. "That's what you call them?"

"You know them by different names?"

"The one you called the Great Snow Cat is actually Yedara, the Betrayed."

"Who the hell is Yedara?" He snorted.

"Don't laugh! She is very important." I raised a hand and tried to smack his forehead with it, but he caught it easily.

"Tell me her story then." He brought my hand down and gently held it in both of his. I was temporarily distracted by how warm and reassuring his fingers were. They traced patterns on my palms and I felt my heart skip a beat.

"Well...um..." I had to clear my throat. "It's a long story, you know."

"We have time. All night, in fact. Until the stars stop shining."

"Long ago, before the mountains were made, there lived a beautiful woman, Yedara, and her husband, Hels."

Valek laughed loudly. "Who comes up with these names?" When I turned to glare at him, he shrugged and nodded for me to continue, turning on his side to look at me while I spoke. His deep blue eyes penetrated the darkness and settled on me with a strange intensity, making it hard for me to concentrate.

"They had a hectic, but wonderful marriage. Each day, they would always argue but by nightfall, all would be right between them once again."

He grinned at that. "I can imagine why."

I ignored him. "But one day, Yedara found Hels with another woman. And that was inexcusable. She ran from him and refused to let him catch her. Hels was furious. The details are blurry but I think that eventually he had her cornered by a cliff and he either pushed her off or she jumped off herself. Then the gods pitied her so they put her up in the sky to honour her as well as to use her to warn other unfortunate women."

"How morbid. Do all your stories end this way?"

I huffed. "Definitely not. There was one about a woman who brained her husband with a soup pot because he was pulling her cat's tail. I forget which constellation that one was attributed to."

"That's a terrible reason for a woman to assault her husband. And with a soup pot, no less. Yedara should have done that instead of getting herself killed."

I turned to look at him, indignant. "I would smash a pot on my husband if he was pulling my cat's tail. Animals should be respected."

He raised his eyebrows. "You would love your cat more than your husband?"

I refused to answer such a ridiculous question. "The husband shouldn't even be tormenting the poor cat in the first place!"

He sighed in exasperation. "I feel sorry for your future husband. Do you remember if you had a pet?"

Hmmm. For some reason the image of valmurs swinging through a thick grove of trees kept flashing through my head but I didn't know if I tried to tame one, or where I saw them. "I might have," I said reluctantly after a pause.

He laughed for a long time. "Poor man."

"Well, I don't have to brain him out if he didn't touch my pet, do I? He'd just have to decide what to give up: his atrocious, not to mention cruel tail pulling habits...or me?"

"Well, if it was me, I'd keep pulling."

I scoffed, sat up abruptly and tried to stand but he prevented me from doing that. "No, don't go, Lena. I didn't mean that. Of course I would choose you."

I froze and stopped breathing. Valek's face was also frozen, as if he'd just realised what he had said. With a curse, he stood and wandered to a slump of weeds a few yards away. I held still, not wanting to disturb him. I also didn't want to contemplate what he meant by that. The answer was dangerous. Very dangerous.

After a long pause, he beckoned for me to join him, his face still turned away from me. He sat before them and stared at them. I looked at the weeds quizically. They looked like any other tenacious and prickly weeds to me. Valek looked up at the sky and peered at the moon. Before I could ask him what he was doing, he put a finger to his lips.

"Watch," he whispered.

That was it. This man was crazy. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. His hand clamped on my wrist, as if he knew that I was contemplating leaving. Sighing, I directed my gaze once again to the stupid weeds. What did it mean? I asked myself. What did he mean by 'of course I would choose you"? All that I knew was that I was feeling some sort of exasperated frustration. Would he never tell me what he really meant? Why did he always insist on changing the topic whenever our conversation drifted into these situations? The only thing that I could assume was that he either didn't want to believe what he himself had just implied or that he never felt that way for me in the first place.

As the moon moved out from behind some wispy clouds in the sky, the meadow was illuminated with silvery magic. When moonlight fell on the leaves of the weeds, they began to shift. A small bud slowly emerged from the center of each weed and as we watched, it grew and opened to reveal a glowing flower the color of the moon. The blossom let out an intoxicating fragrance, which defied description.

"The Lady of the Night," Valek told me triumphantly.

I was reluctant to respond. When would he get over his denial already? But the name of the flower forcefully extracted a snort of derision of me. "And you said that Yedara was a terrible name."

"It is. What's wrong with Lady of the Night?"

"It sounds like the name of um...a place of...a place with a bad reputation, or a really bad novel."

He sighed, shaking his head at me. "It's not only appreciated for it's beauty, but also for the fact that...never mind. Wait silently without moving for a few minutes and you'll see what I'm talking about."

Despite myself, I was intrigued. We sat side by side in perfect silence and stillness and I found myself observing him. I felt a pang of sadness. When we got to the Citadel, I would have to leave this exasperating man. And even though I didn't understand why, I couldn't help but wish that I didn't have to. When I had found out he was an assassin, I had immediately labeled him as a cocky, and dangerous individual. How wrong I was. If only I had known then that he would be showing me a simple flower with such reverence.

A small fluttering flash of blue flew rapidly past my ear. I forced myself not to flinch, but couldn't help breathing in a sharp breath. As it landed on the flower, I saw that it was a butterfly, and that it was extracting the flower's nectar. Another butterfly, this one pale gold, quickly joined it and soon, Valek and I were sitting amongst a swirl of fluttering wings and beautiful colors. Our gazes met and we continued to look at each other long after the butterflies were gone.

Valek the was one who broke the silence. "We should probably get some rest. We'll probably reach the Citadel tomorrow."

He looked as if he was about to say more but when I waited, he remained silent. So this was probably going to be the last night that I get to see him. The wide meadows didn't seem to contain enough air for me to breathe in. My throat was growing tight and my eyes were burning.

Before I could cry, I pulled off my cloak and lay down, wrapping it snugly around myself. Small sounds told me that Valek was probably doing the same thing. The only reason I was crying, I told myself sternly, was because of nostalgia. After all, he was the first person that I had seen after I woke up and he was the first memory I had. It only made sense that I was growing ever so slightly attached. But once I regained all my memories, all this would change, wouldn't it?

Regardless, I was forced to accept the fact that I didn't want this to change. I felt so carefree being with him, and I didn't want to face any troubles that I might have had in my past life. But why did I feel so different around him? The answer to that question led to an unwelcome conclusion. It terrified me so much, I forced myself into a deep slumber.

:)