Dear Nicholas,

I'm in the midst of what could possibly be my most uncomfortable car ride ever! After having been fed some melodramatic dialogue and having my valise thrust into my arms, I was herded aboard some kind of loaned military vehicle, dressed in a ridiculously medieval ensemble thoughtfully provided by the Headmistress, and am now bound for the Wall.

The Magistrix informed me that I could leave one telegram at the wall to be sent after my departure, if I chose to take advantage of the opportunity, and you'd better be appropriately grateful that I've used mine on you! Actually, there was something I'd wanted to tell you before I left . . . you see, we've known one another for ages, haven't we? It seems almost ridiculous to say, but you must know, I -

The truck stopped so abruptly that Alara's fountain pen jabbed her finger rather sharply and fell to the ground, splashing ink on her valises. She made a slight clicking sound with her tongue, scowling deeply as the back of the truck was pulled open and two soldiers dressed in uniform peered at her curiously from below the brims of their military-issue caps.

"I don't know if this is the right one," one of them began anxiously, tapping his fingers nervously on the brim of the door. "She looks far too small to be sixteen. And she's alone."

At the mention of the word alone her gaze, which had been drifting aimlessly around what little scenery she could see behind them, snapped back into focus abruptly. "What do you mean, alone? Was I supposed to have company in the back of this dark, bumpy, rather unstable vehicle? Because I don't really think anyone else would have comfortably fit." It was a surprisingly out-of-character outburst for the normally quiet Alara, who could usually be counted on to remind others that beauty was simplicity and fewer words said more - but before she could gather the courage to interrupt them with an apology an out-of-breath figure stumbled into them and waved a weary hand at her.

In response to the glances of the two guards, Sam grinned good-naturedly and showed them a large canvas traveling bag. "It appears I missed the truck after all," he said, still breathing rather heavily and clutching his chest for support. "Sorry about that. I was supposed to be at the school, but then your friend got lost on the way back and by the time I grabbed my bag and made it there they told me you'd already left."

"I had," Alara replied with a shrug, not knowing what else to say. "If I'd known I was supposed to wait for you, I would have taken the opportunity to pack a few more things. As it is, I don't know where I'm headed, or how I'm to get there." She paused for an impatient breath and bent forward to pick up her valise from the floor of the car, opening her mouth to continue until she noticed he was smiling in a way that made her slightly nervous. What did he know? Folding her arms over her chest to keep from shivering, she gave him a look.

He shifted uncomfortably, looking this way and that before finally meeting her gaze across the covered bed of the truck where she sat perched on a wooden crate. "You see, it's like this . . . because I'm from the Old Kingdom and know how to get you where you're going, that is, somewhere quite far from the Wall, I, er." He paused for a moment, not really sure of how to continue. "The Old Kingdom is still a monarchy, which I'm sure you knew already, and my parents are in charge, which makes me - anyhow, that isn't important. What I mean is that you were in need of someone familiar with the terrain and the people to get you around and keep you out of trouble, and I was elected." It was more difficult to explain than he'd thought.

She didn't answer for a moment, looking down at her shoes. In her handmade wool cloak and long skirt she looked more like some form of Old Kingdom nobility than the Ancelstierran schoolgirl she always had been, and when her eyes finally met his, they both smiled briefly.

"So, what is it like to be a prince?" Alara said with a small laugh, shifting her valise from hand to hand. He'd done some kind of Charter Magic to lighten it, the details of which she didn't quite catch, but she still needed to change arms from time to time to keep her arms from hurting too much. They'd been walking for about four and a half hours, stopping only twice for short water breaks before continuing steadily northward.

Sam had also changed into handmade clothing, his canvas bag strapped on his back over a dark-green woollen cloak, with a heavy sweater and long breeches beneath. He pushed a hand through his curly hair and smiled briefly at her, pausing to think for a moment. "It's not your average student job," he admitted with a shrug. "I mean, I have all of these 'official' festivals and things that I have to participate in because I'm the heir to the throne, and my sister's favourite hobby is bossing me around, so my school holidays aren't really holidays at all since I spend them doing a lot of things I'd rather not do. I don't even get my homework done most of the time." It felt good to get that off his chest, even if it meant he was now struggling to catch his breath.

The southern landscape was surprisingly bleak for early spring; they'd both shivered more than once on the long trek starting from the Wall, despite being bundled in multiple layers of heavy clothing. There was a bit of a light wind stirring the leaves on the trees, occasionally blowing something in their path or causing the hem of a cloak to snag on a branch. Their route was taking them far from settlements, save for a sparse few villages scattered around the base of a low hill they passed about an hour into their walk.

Still, Sam felt a curious feeling of homecoming, the same he had every time he crossed the border. Everything about the Old Kingdom felt right, as if he was finally back where he belonged. His father had once described a similar feeling after one of their frequent "official" visits to Ancelstierre, and Ellimere was generally known to be in a better mood for the first two or three days after coming back from school. He wondered how this other girl felt, the one walking beside him. Alara, a name he knew for certain wasn't Ancelstierran. What was she looking for in the Old Kingdom? Whatever it was, he knew she hadn't expected to find it so soon; she looked tired, slightly frustrated, and cold - her pale cheeks were taking on a distinctly blue tinge, and she was having trouble keeping her lips still.

"Are you okay?" he said, startling her out of her reverie. She looked slightly surprised at being asked, but nodded gently, swallowing once and setting her valise down so she could push a wayward strand of hair out of her face. "Really, we can stop if you want."

"I'd like to stop," she admitted. "I haven't done this much walking in a while, and I'm exhausted. You don't mind, do you?" A brief smile flashed across her face as she shrugged her shoulders, twisting this way and that to get the kinks out of her upper back. Her face was cold, her hands were cold, and all she wanted to do was collapse on the cold ground and go to sleep, but he was looking at her as if he was waiting for something, and she realised that she'd left their conversation hanging without realising it. "It must be difficult, I suppose. Having to deal with the things that you do."

Some part of Sam wanted to agree completely, to accept the pity he thought he deserved. Or maybe it wasn't pity. Either way, it seemed strange to be standing there with her talking about kingdoms and castles when six hours before they'd been in a tea shop discussing leaving balls over cups of earl grey. The conversation could use a bit of lightening, and he knew just how to do that. She had seated herself carefully on the ground, arms folded and doing that stare-off-into-the-distance thing that seemed to be a regular habit of hers, looking for all the world like a . . . oh, for heaven's sake.

He sat down on a rock facing her, leaning elbows on his knees, a roguish grin spreading his lips slightly. "So, what were you going to say at the end of that telegram to Nicholas?" he asked innocently, crossing his arms to keep in more warmth.

"What telegram?" she replied, drawing her eyebrows together slightly. "I didn't write to him."

Sam arched an eyebrow at her. "Oh, but you did. I saw it on the floor of the truck and called after you, but you were already out of earshot, so I took the liberty of seeing who it was addressed to." He shivered briefly and drew his shoulders in. "I'd written something for him also, so I put them both in the same envelope, but I noticed that yours was unsigned and unfinished." As he'd predicted, her face coloured brilliantly and she put her hands to her cheeks, shaking her head gently.

"You're not supposed to read mail for other people!" she cried, unable to hold back an embarrassed laugh. "I completely forgot about finishing it, or sending it. It was about to take on a rather bleak tone anyhow, being as how I'm not sure I'll ever see him again." Her pale face quickly grew serious, as she intertwined her fingers and stared at them for a long moment, not saying anything else. Nicholas seemed so far away, at school across the Wall where it was early fall and students went about with jackets tossed carelessly over their shoulders.

He'd always been the quickest to laugh, the first to toss something across the table at an official dinner or drag her outside to see the gardens in pouring rain. They were never romantic, but there was something quiet and gentle and unspoken between the two of them nonetheless. When she'd kissed him on the cheek before leaving the tea shop that afternoon (at least, it had been afternoon in Ancelstierre - she had no idea what time it was across the Wall, difficult as it was to calculate the difference) he'd pressed her hand between both of his, warm from holding his teacup, and thus they missed the chance to properly say goodbye.

To her surprise, a tear flowed slowly down her cheek and dried almost instantly, blown away in the now-freezing wind.

From his limited vantage point on the rock, Sam tilted his head to the side and studied her carefully. "Are you . . . that is to say, are you crying? I didn't mean to upset you." She looked so lost, Sam thought. Carrying a handmade soft valise that he was certain didn't belong to her, dressed in strange clothes and sitting on the ground in the middle of a flat prairie that stretched as far as the eye could see.

And yet there was something inherently familiar about her being there, something different about her ever since they'd crossed the wall and entered the Old Kingdom. Excepting her straight black hair and fair skin, she could have been one of the Clayr, with her clear green eyes and air of quiet knowledge. There was something about her face vaguely reminiscent of Lirael, and Sam groaned inwardly at the thought – it would be just his luck if she turned out to be a distant relation just as he was beginning to take a liking to her. As of late, Lirael had been traveling all over the kingdom with Sabriel and never seemed to have a spare word for Sam, who spent most of his time in his workshop tinkering with copper wire and Charter Magic.

It had been difficult, the past year or so; possibly two, if Sam's muddled recollections of the chaos south of the Wall was any indicator. Nick had been rushed to hospital and spent the next six weeks recuperating, while Touchstone and Sabriel fell back into their royal duties with barely a pause and Lirael locked herself in her spacious quarters, coming down for the occasional meal but spending her days reading books from Belisaere's massive library. Ellimere was still . . . well, she was still Ellimere. If it wasn't a new "terribly close friend" she wanted to push on him it was endless menial tasks like spending time observing the work done in various parts of the castle or making visits for the sake of royal appearances. He was glad when the Ancelstierran school year finally started and he and Nick were reunited at last, for one last year as Nick was starting at university and Sam would return to the Old Kingdom for good.

Now Nick was in Ancelstierre, preparing for the end of his first eventful year at university, while Ellimere, Lirael and his parents were at Belisaere or somewhere about the more populated regions of the kingdom, doing what they all did best, presumably.

And Sameth was here, in what he best described to himself as the absolute centre of nowhere (though he felt that to be somewhat of an understatement, given the present scenery – or lack thereof, more accurately) with a very uncomfortable knapsack at his feet and a relative stranger across from him, softly asleep with her arms wrapped around her knees. He hadn't even noticed her drift off, so lost had he been in his own thoughts.

Carefully standing up and crouching on the ground so as not to disturb her, he opened the pack and took out a sparse blanket, hoping it would be enough for both of them. A mild south-easterly wind was blowing small pieces of black hair across her forehead, and Sam, not trusting the weather to remain the same any more than in other parts of the country, took her gingerly by the shoulders and turned her slightly, so as not to catch the wind full-on should it pick up speed later in the evening.

She swayed slightly but remained upright, curled up tightly for warmth with her chin nearly touching her chest. As he cast a Charter Magic spell for warmth and wrapped his cloak tightly about him, Sam pulled the blanket over and leaned his back against the rock for support. A sudden gust of wind swayed her in his direction and he caught her with a hand before she'd moved enough to wake, instinctively moving closer to the warmth from her cloaked form, easing her head onto his shoulder.

Before Sam even had time to pull the blanket completely over either of them, the weight of his head became too much and he fell asleep.