Chapter 31, Proved love
The sun was peeking up above the horizon in the east, to its relief once again finding that the world still was there.
Kevin looked up to watch the rising colors on the sky. The trees and cliffs were in the way for him to see the sun itself, but the sky naturally spread out above him, Karl, Lise, the birds and the Flame Kahn. Clouds in purple floated on the divine fire up there, spreading out like angel wings against the blue to the west.
As Kevin's hands stopped moving against her back Lise turned over and followed his soft gaze, smiling at the beauty above. Putting her arms under her head she laid on the muscles that were almost buzzing softly after the relaxing treatment they had received.
Karl was still sleeping, happy after his hunt and full of the duck he had caught. In any case he was colorblind, so seeing the sunrise hadn't meant much to him anyway.
Eventually all colors began to fade to blue and white, but it was allowed to take the time it needed for it.
Peaceful.
Kevin shifted and stretched out with a yawn as the colors almost had faded completely.
"How are your hands after that?" Lise asked in a low voice, still lying with her head on her arms.
"No problem."
"Thanks, it felt great. I really needed a massage. And you're good at it."
"Ah…" Kevin mumbled and scratched his neck, another soft chuckle from Lise telling him that he'd managed that expression she loved again.
Well if she liked it he wouldn't have to feel bad about being so shy anymore…
That thought was lightly said relieving.
She was truly beautiful again as she laid there, smiling up at him. She didn't exactly have all her strength back but thanks to Wisp it was already a lot better.
The shadows of the trees' leaves and the sunlight played over her skin, tunic and hair, high lightening every little detail while her chest slowly moved by every breath and moved the tunic's cloth over her body.
'Oh, this isn't going to end well…' Kevin thought and desperately tried to look away.
He struggled against the almost irresistible urge to lie down beside Lise and kiss her, for right then he didn't know what would happen if he did so.
Lately, just in the last few days… the thing was that he wasn't really a boy in his middle teens any longer, because of the Mana power he was more of twenty; grown. So, lately he sometimes could become worried about how strongly he felt for Lise.
Can't look away, so beautiful when she smiles…
Argh.
He tried to mentally slap himself and managed to command his body to stand up.
"Be back soon, alright?" he muttered and walked away, through the bushes towards the river and the ruins.
Lise slowly got up into a sitting position, pulled up her knees to her chest and fondly looked after Kevin. Not that she could see him with all the leaves in the way.
But after a moment her smile faded.
'I'll have suitors when I come back to Rolante… whether or not he wants to come with me.'
Earlier the thought had troubled her, now it made her feel sick.
She had noticed that the unwritten rule of courtship, even in Rolante as it was custom in other human lands, was that suitors could come even if there already was a fiancé. That was of course due to the fact that nobles sought out the most favorable part so overtime was silently allowed.
'To Hell with them, I want Kevin and nobody else!' her mind growled.
It was just that she didn't even know what he thought of the idea…
Argh.
Most of all she'd like to get up and find him to ask if he wanted to stay with her in Rolante, but she also knew that whatever privacy he had felt need for she should respect.
'You want to marry him?' Duty piped up, 'how long have you known him?'
'Several years if you count the time in the Mana stone's blessing!' Lise snapped back, 'and how long would I get to know any suitor?'
'Ehh…'
'Exactly, shut up.'
"Lise…"
"Hmm?"
She looked up and smiled at Wisp.
"Good morning."
"The same to you, princess."
The holy elemental lowered a bit and once again cleared his throat, symbolically done of course.
"Say, Lise," he said in an innocent voice, "want me to cast a spell on you to prevent you from becoming pregnant?"
The vanadis choked down a shout of plain surprise but almost fell over in the process instead.
"Wisp! That's horrible!" she coughed, trying to catch her breath.
"You're right but…"
Wisp lowered to the height of her face and kindly, yet with an edge of graveness, met her narrowed eyes.
"… Look, there's no use tiptoeing around it," he said, "it's gonna happen sooner or later. You're too close to each other, too grown, too much in love. It might not be here since we are all around you, but that won't last."
He didn't give her much to retort with. Lise opened and closed her mouth a couple of times, dumbfounded. Finally she just shook her head.
"It's still horrible," she grunted and looked away, "and having you cast such a spell would just be like confirming that…"
"… It'll happen, yes. I understand."
Wisp sighed.
"This is really embarrassing for me too, you know," he pointed out, "but I think it's necessary."
'And so does my buddies and Kevin's mum…' the holy elemental grunted in his thoughts, feeling sort of bullied into the situation.
That feeling wasn't too false either, if you cornered it.
Lise rubbed the back of her neck, without thinking about it mimicking one of Kevin's ways of giving away embarrassment. When she eventually realized that she let the hand fall with a sigh.
"You might have a point," she muttered, "but that would sort of… I don't know, lock the door. I don't even know if he'd want to be my husband when this is all over."
'Did I just speak it out loud? Oh dear.'
"Well, I can't answer that," Wisp softly said, glancing towards the bushes, "you'll have to ask him about it."
'Oh… help…'
Lise hardly dared to move her gaze aside.
Halfway out of the greenery as if he had frozen in the middle of a step Kevin stood, staring at the ground as he rubbed his neck with one hand. Parts of his mane was glued together into heavy, dropping locks; it seemed like he had been throwing water from the river into his own face.
It was pretty obvious that he had heard a fair chunk of the conversation. Maybe not enough to catch the whole picture but Lise's last words certainly hadn't escaped him.
'Oh… help…'
For an excruciatingly stretched moment it seemed like no one was going to move an inch, less look up.
Then the two birds almost simultaneously landed on either side of Kevin and gave him a kind yet resolute push forwards with their wings. He stumbled, nearly trampled on the Flame Kahn's back but finally ended up sitting before Lise while she nervously shifted to sit on her knees. Her hands hesitantly landed on her lap, which in turn was covered by two layers of cloth with the tunic and blanket.
Of course, a push from the birds wouldn't help choking any words out of a blank mind.
That was what Karl was there for. Without a warning he woke up, yawned, stretched and happily placed himself on the ground again, this time with his head on Kevin's lap. The half blood's hand fell to the fur by itself and he seemed to relax just by touching the puppy. At least his worst tension looked like it left as his shoulders fell a bit and he let out a deep breath.
But he still didn't dare to look up.
Carefully Lise reached out and buried her fingers in the warmly gray-brown hairs covering the young wolf. The fine, soft fur tickled her hand and the familiar feeling was somehow calming.
Karl watched his human friends without a sound, his tail softly brushing the ground in hopeful expectation.
Inevitably Kevin and Lise's fingers touched and carefully entwined.
'Come on, come on, come on, come on!' Wisp desperately thought as they seemed frozen yet again.
He was out of tricks by now. Couldn't even call Dryad to suddenly fill the ground with flowers… but in any case such a fairytale thing probably would have taken the wrong turn with these two love birds...
"I… ah…"
Lise uncomfortably scratched her head with her free hand, struggling with the words.
She would have needed a chance to assemble a lot of courage for this moment, for the love of the goddess…
'It's Kevin, for goodness sake! Kevin! What's this whole panicky thing?' she tried to tell herself, to little avail.
"You'd…"
Kevin fell silent and Lise dared to look up, finding that he was focusing completely on their hands. Feeling somehow better knowing that she lowered her gaze to that area as well.
"You'd want to marry me?" the half blood prince finally managed to force out of his mouth.
"Of course I do."
As she whispered that Lise barely could hear herself, placing her other hand on the held ones.
"But I can't leave Rolante so it's not just that," she more or less stammered in a more audible voice, "you'd have to be the king of my kingdom…"
"I know."
Kevin added his last hand to complete the collection.
"Doesn't matter," he said and straightened up his neck, causing Lise to follow the movement as she saw it in the corner of her eyes.
He smiled, shyly.
"I could have been king of Beast Kingdom, but I want to be with you."
It was almost ridiculous how easy the tension melted away, just after letting that out the mountain turned to clouds.
Lise smiled back.
"But me, only fifteen to world," the half blood pointed out with a frown.
"It's alright, we'll probably have much to be taken cared of in Rolante before we can have a wedding. But first we have to find Elliot."
"Yeah. So you rest now."
"Yes, yes, I know."
Lise let go of Kevin's hands and laid back down, shaking her head with a trace of the smile still left on her lips.
"I'll rest, fine," she said, crossing her arms in a mocking of weariness at the whole situation, "in any case we can't do anything until the Flame Kahn is awake and well too."
By mentioning the man both of the humans turned their heads in his direction. Two sets of eyebrows went up.
"Wisp, what are you doing?" the vanadis asked.
Not healing stars but what looked like half moons were falling from thin air above the Kahn's head, disappearing as soon as they touched him. Wisp was floating beside the man, his normally happy eyes narrowed and reddish with intense concentration. As he heard Lise he snapped up and panted for breath (symbolically, of course…). The moons ceased to fall and the Kahn turned over with a grunt.
"Well, I did mention that Dryad is the only one of us who can put people to sleep, didn't I?" the holy elemental gasped and tiredly thudded onto the ground.
"Yes?" Kevin said.
"Phew… do you know how hard it is to make up a new spell, and that quickly?"
"Why did you do that?" Lise asked, puzzled.
"I had to do something!" Wisp grunted, "the old man was about to wake up at the worst possible time, couldn't have that now!"
There was a silence.
Then a shared laugh.
"You're a true hero!" Lise said with a wide grin and gave Wisp a nudge with her hand.
It was like touching a heap of pleasantly warm feathers, not what the princess had expected after seeing him tackle Jagan heads on several times.
"Aww, chucks…" the holy elemental said and turned a bit pink again.
"Ngh…"
With a groan the Flame Kahn sat up pressing a hand against his head.
"What happened…?" he muttered in a slightly unstable voice.
Wisp got up and flew over to him, giving him a new dose of healing energy instead of sleeping force.
"You were about to get killed by a vampire and a bunch of demons, but we saved you," the holy elemental informed.
"I was what? Who?"
The elderly ninja blinked at the white flame that watched him with nothing but friendliness.
"I'm Wisp, the elemental of Light," the one and only tipped.
"I sort of remembered a picture of you and the others…" the Kahn said and rubbed his forehead, "where am I?"
"Old kingdom of Light, no worry," Kevin said and sat down on the ground a couple of feet away from the man.
"And who are you, then?" the Kahn asked, as politely as possible in his rather confused state.
"I'm Kevin, from the Beast Kingdom. And that's Lise."
"From Rolante," the vanadis carefully said as she sat down beside the half blood.
The Kahn blinked again, then covered his eyes with a hand.
"Oh no, not that Lise, are you?" he groaned.
"Yes. And it's alright," she hurriedly said, "I know it was Bigeau… Isabella who controlled everything."
"I can't say how sorry I am about what happened, Your Majesty," the Kahn sadly said, "it's a tragedy. All I know is that Rolante fell, what happened after that?"
"Well…"
Lise uncomfortably scratched her head, unsure how to tell the Kahn what had occurred. After all, a great chunk of his people had been killed in a war of liberation, and the goddess knew what had happened to those still left in the desert after Jagan had brought the demons into the world.
"I was in exile for a while, but then I returned together with a thief named Hawk…"
"He's alive?" the Kahn interrupted, a weak smile on his lips.
"Yes, and since he's not here I must tell you that the thing with your son was a setup by Bigeau."
The elderly man sadly nodded.
"So I have understood," he bitterly said and cringed, covering his eyes with his hand again, "and then Jessica…"
"Wisp say Salamando saw her be saved," Kevin quickly said.
"What?!"
The Kahn's head swept aside and he stared at the holy elemental, who profusely nodded.
"Yep, your Hawk saved her from right under Bigeau's nose," he informed.
"Thank the goddess…"
For a moment the man smiled, then he gravely looked at Lise again.
"So, what happened after you and Hawk came to Rolante?"
The princess shook her head and looked at the ground, unable to face the man when she gave him the painful truth about his people.
"When we got there we learned that there were more survivors than I could have ever hoped for," she began, "so we joined them in their planning on retaking the castle. With the help of three traveling warriors we gained Jinn's aid and spread the sleeping flowers over Rolante, using the same tactic as Bigeau. Then we invaded. I'm not sure how many of your warriors were killed, I'm sorry."
The Kahn's hand covered his eyes.
"Many fled, however," Lise quickly added, "there were troops guarding Palo, and I believe the most of them managed to get out after Bigeau's spell was broken."
"Don't feel guilty, it's not your fault."
The older man removed his hand and shook his head.
"You did what you had to do and it was the right thing. Not pleasant, but Bigeau had to be stopped. But why are you here now and not in Rolante?" he asked.
"My brother Elliot was kidnapped during the first attack," the vanadis explained, "and I need to find him. You didn't happen to see a blind boy in Navarre while you were there?"
However there wasn't much hope in the question, considering the man's state up till now. And he shook his head.
"I hardly knew if I was alive while I was imprisoned," he sadly said, "I'm sorry, Your Majesty."
"Call me Lise, I'm not even crowned queen yet…"
"Fair enough."
The Kahn tried a smile but didn't manage very well.
"So tell me, how on earth did you end up in the kingdom of Light?"
It took quite a while to explain that, as you surely understand…
Lise sleeplessly watched the dark sky above her, resting her head on the small pillow and one arm. Stars twinkled down at her, the soft rustling of wind and the whispering sound of Kevin and Karl breathing all she heard. It could have been the Moonlight forest…
Another day had passed. She had been tired through most of it but managed to stay awake, mostly thanks to all the events taking place. First that thing with Wisp's question, and then the proposal and finally the Kahn waking up. It was just fine that her day rhythm was mended, after the last days it had been pretty much wrecked with her sleeping almost all the time.
But now that she was supposed to sleep she found it hard. Typical.
Well, they had told the Kahn everything, and decided to head for the desert to try to find Hawk and Jessica as soon as possible. The transportation problem would be solved as their fellow elemental would give his Moon sister a call and ask her to send another bird for the new traveler.
According to Wisp Salamando believed that the thief and desert princess were in the village of Deen, he didn't think that in the state the woman had been in they'd dare to travel further. There was no telling if she had recovered; the spirit of Fire had enough troubles trying to reach out of his closest area, so he couldn't watch very well over the more peaceful creatures of his lands. The demons' presence was giving him a headache.
To Navarre then. But what they would do in the desert was still not fully planned, still there were nowhere else they could go now. It was the only stronghold of the demons that they knew.
But what could be done… storming the fortress seemed a bit too much of a mouthful…
Lise rolled onto her side to watch Kevin's face in the darkness, trying to stop the troubling thoughts from taking over. Her eyes had gotten used to the dusk long ago and she had no troubles seeing him clearly. Looking at his peaceful face she warmly smiled, a tender sparkle spreading throughout her body at the sight.
There would still be suitors, but she wouldn't have to worry about that as much anymore. He really did want her…
Carefully she reached out but stopped before her fingers touched Kevin's face. No, she didn't want to wake him up, no matter how alluring the will to caress his cheek was.
A careful glow came out of thin air, the light hardly adding anything to the soft moonlight. Lise threw a glance upwards and gave Wisp a small smile as he watched her for a moment.
'How about that spell?' he softly whispered to her mind.
Used to it as he had done so before Lise wasn't exactly surprised.
She watched Kevin's features that seemed to glow in the light from the three moons, and she found herself fondly smiling.