Chapter 2:
Diana found herself in front of a small group of Elders yet again for the third time that month. This time she had gotten herself in trouble for oversleeping that morning and missing her duties. She had been up all night with her books on the rooftop that she had claimed as her own private sanctuary to hide away in from the other Solari and had managed to fall asleep on the roof instead of in her own bed, missing wake up call. They were angry with her, again, though her continued infractions were a nuisance and showed lack of discipline and lack of commitment to Solari tradition, it wasn't enough to do much more than hand out a light punishment each time. Usually they would make her take on extra duties for a week or make her spend a day tending to one of the gardens in the temple grounds, this time they chose the latter, she would be spending the rest of today tending to the garden.
She spent her time in the garden cursing out how much she hated the sun, it was bright and its heat overbearing on day like this. She figured that was most likely the point of her punishment, they knew how much she hated it. Eventually her tending to the garden was interrupted, she expected to look up and find one of the Elders having come to criticise her skills as a gardener and had a retort waiting on her tongue only for her to find Leona standing in front of her, wearing her golden plated ceremonial armour. It had been a few days since Leona had asked Diana for help in the library, Diana had expected to see Leona again so soon, let alone at all.
"I'm afraid I'm going to need to ask you for a favour again." Leona said with a smile, the idea of her helping Leona again made her heart skip a beat. She turned her head down to where she was tending the garden to hide the warmth she felt spread across her own face.
"What do you need?" Diana made her best attempt to sound formal, distant, the last thing she wanted was the Chosen to think that she had a fascination with her.
"I need someone new to spar with and I think you can help me." Diana lifted her eyes from the ground to look up at Leona in confusion, she had no clue as to why Leona would want her out of anyone on Mt Targon to spar with her. Diana was as close to a bad choice as picking a child would be.
"I've never received combat training." Diana tried to brush Leona off, not wanting to suffer the embarrassment of losing horrifically in a sparring match with the Chosen.
"That doesn't matter, there's always a time to learn." Leona offered, trying to convince Diana to come with her though she couldn't figure out why. Sparring with Diana would be far from a challenge for Leona, someone who had magical abilities given to her by the sun and had been receiving combat training since she was able to wield a weapon. Diana had spent most of her life behind books and in classrooms, she had chosen to go without combat training when it was offered to her because to her it seemed useless though the way Leona was looking at her made her want to give it a try anyway.
"I don't think it would be a good idea. I don't think the Elders would want you anywhere near me." Diana said before going back to her gardening.
"And why's that?" Leona asked, it caused Diana to wonder if Leona really didn't know her reputation or was playing dumb with her. Everyone knew how much trouble Diana caused the Elders, there was no way that Leona didn't know what people thought of her.
"I would be a bad influence, I think, is what the Elders would say if they knew you wanted to spend any time with me." Diana was trying to offer the Chosen a way out from her decision to try spend time with her, even though on the inside she really wanted to accept the offer.
"Good thing I don't have to listen to them then." Leona offered her hand out to Diana, "Come on." She said, encouraging Diana to take her hand. Diana finally gave in, Leona wasn't planning on listening to her protests it seemed, and took the Chosen's hand and let herself be led to the sparring grounds behind the temple. Leona gave Diana a practice weapon before stripping off some of the larger pieces of her armour. Diana averted her eyes once she found herself starring at Leona, having never seen the Chosen before outside of the armour she was given years ago, or at least that was what she was choosing to believe the reason for her staring was.
Diana knew well before Leona even came at her in their sparring match that it would be a quick, decisive defeat. The Chosen had her on her back within about thirty seconds, she wheezed after the wind had been knocked out of her, Leona was somehow even stronger than Diana had expected. Leona stood over her and took hold of her wrist, pulling her up to her feet. Leona spent the rest of the time before dark teaching Diana some of the pure basics of combat, justifying it to Diana as it being a necessity for her to know how to fight. Diana was still puzzled by the Chosen's behavior but was far from thinking about stopping her from trying to talk to her.