A/N: Thank you all soooo much for the reviews! I love them.

Cereal: not the best inspiration food out there, but it gets the job done.

Chapter 5: Another Town, Another Surprise

Lana took both noses and pinched hard and held. In a just few short seconds, her brothers sat up gasping for air. They started to grouch and complain but she silenced them, "Hush!" She whispered harshly, "The three of us have gotten lazy since we left Karucia. Now come on, get up."

Vincent and Damien rose, Vincent with more groaning.

"You lazies!" She hissed in good humor. "And keep quiet, Zain and Leon are still asleep."

"Lucky," Vincent commented quietly.

Lana went to her packs to find new clothes to wear for the day. She looked over as she pulled brown breeches and an undyed cotton shirt. What she had meant to be a glance turned into a stare as she caught Zain's sleeping form. Some of his dark brown hair escaped its hold and stuck to his face with what she thought might be sweat. He twitched and his eyes fluttered. His clothes were twisted on him, probably from tossing and turning. Because of that his sleeves had come up to reveal bandages that covered all of his forearm.

Lana might have investigated further but she heard two voices.

"Iolana," Vincent said in an annoying tone.

"Would you mind taking down the shield?" Damien finished.

Lana murmured a quick spell, ended it with, "So mote it be!" and a clap of her hands.

The shield vanished. She left where the protective circle had been—scuffing the line of herbs with her foot—and changed. Upon finding her brothers she realized they were waiting for her. They had gone a ways from their campsite.

She scowled at her two brothers standing idle, "You know how to stretch!"

And with that, their morning practice commenced.

Zain and Leon were awake when they finally finished. Everything on their campsite was packed up (the triplets had put away their belongings before their morning practice) and a fire had been started.

"Do you do that every morning?" Leon asked.

"When I can wake them up." Lana responded. Something nudged her back. Flash was awake too and he had broken the tether. "Oh, you horrible beast!" But her voice was soft and not angry at all as she petted his nose.

"You spoil him too much," Vincent said, "Its a wonder he's not a show-horse."

Lana shrugged, "He'd be too bored."

The men watched as Lana tugged what was left of the tether, whispering things to her faithful—well usually faithful—mount. She pulled him along back to the small crowd of horses. Leon frowned.

"Does she think the horse will understand her?"

Vincent looked up and gave a noncommittal shrug.

Leon didn't seem satisfied, he tried something more specific, "So, I take it she likes animals?" He made it a question.

Surprisingly, it was Damien who spoke, "She cares about anything that can breath."

The two brothers shared a look and then looked away, both shaking their heads in perfect unison, a small smile one Vincent's face. Their eyes were lost in memory. Leon expected them to say something, but they never did. He looked over to Zain to see if he had thought the same thing, but Zain, too, was lost somewhere else. By the look in his eyes, it couldn't be too grand.

Quick as a whip, both brothers left their trance-like state. Damien turned to begin the breakfast preparations.

Lana didn't know what she expected to see when she came back, but a group of men sitting together quietly was definitely not on the list. Damien was peacefully making breakfast, Vincent talking to him in quiet tones. Even if it is somewhat rude! Lana thought, feeling just a small edge of frustration. What could she tell her brothers to make them . . . open up? These seemed like nice people!

Nothing, I can do nothing, not really. She shook her head silently.

Lana wanted to say that Zain looked peaceful, sitting quietly off to one side of their party. But she noticed his somewhat haunted stare he gave to nothing in particular. Immediately her eyes flicked to his arms that she had noticed before but they were well and fully covered now. She knew better than to bring it up.

Finally her eyes settled on Leon. He reclined back on his elbows as easily if he were lounging on a couch. One leg was bent while the other stretched forward. His face was turned upward eyes closed. Involuntarily her eyes glided back down the length of his body and when she came back to his face again one of his light brown eyes was open and his lips turned up in a slight smirk.

Lana's face burned. He had been posing! She turned away from him with a glare and sat near her brothers.

Leon sat up after he received the sought after response. "Shouldn't you be making the breakfast?"

Lana sat up a little straighter and raised her brows. "Are you referring to me?"

"Yes."

She shrugged and settled back into a comfortable position. "I will not be making every meal. It's good for a man to know how make something, anything. That way they won't need to be solely dependent on women," She smiled, "gods know women aren't solely dependent on men."

He took his own turn to raise his brows. "You believe that don't you?"

"I don't go around spouting things I don't believe."

Leon opened his mouth to say something else. Lana, feeling the first stirrings of anger, silently dared him to say something else. But no words came from the blond haired man because Vincent intervened with one of his usual smiles. "Lets see, where are we headed today?"

"You already know where we are headed, Vincent." A thread of anger had worked its way into her voice.

"Really?" Vincent's smile was still in place but his eyes told her a different message. "Calm down."

Lana was furious with herself. She had risen to the bait and let herself get angry. Stupid, stupid! She took a deep breath and released it slowly. "Yes, really."

Silence followed. Vincent seemed to have used more energy than he had at that moment because his smile fell and he yawned. Leon after his first show of spark, had drawn back, silently. After a few minutes Lana didn't know how much more silence she could handle.

"If the lot of you are going to be this silent every morning, I don't know what I'll do." Lana said.

"Mithros," Leon said as if he'd just realized something in horror, "she's a morning person isn't she?"

Vincent shook his head slowly with a small laugh, "If only we were that lucky."

"What do you mean."

It was Damien who answered. "She's an all-day person."

Lana frowned. "You make it sound like a bad thing."

Leon looked somewhat confused. "What do you mean by an 'all-day person'?"

"It means, any time of the day and she'll be just as bright and chipper as she is right now." Vincent said. As if to help his point Lana smiled, but it stretched to a grin. Vincent shook his head. "A horribly unnatural thing, that."

Lana found a very small pebble and threw it at him, effectively hitting him on the forehead.

"Ow!"

"I am not unnatural. Your just very lazy." She smiled and seemed pleased with herself.

Vincent rubbed his forehead. "That hurt, you know."

"Good. If your feelings are still hurting later feel free to try to get me back."

"Oh, I will."

Lana's laughter made Zane's gaze slide slowly to her, as if he was finally waking up and seeing his surroundings. But she didn't notice. He just shook his head and rubbed his eyes.

Lana was tightening one of the straps when something nudged her upper thigh. She looked down to find one horse sniffing eagerly at her pants. She laughed and reached into her pocket pulling out an apple, "And I'd gotten this far without it being noticed."

"I'm sorry." Zain mumbled trying to get his mounts attention.

"No need to be sorry," She held the apple out to the horse who took it delicately. "Does she have a name?"

"What makes you think its a female?" He asked.

Lana shrugged. "Sorry for assuming--"

"No, no, you were correct. I just wanted to know why you thought she was female and not male." Zain said. "Nezumi, her name is Nezumi."

Lana stroked down the long snout. "Nezumi, mouse. She's lovely." Just as she said it Flash turned and butted her with his own head and huffed, as if trying to remind her of the task at hand: him. She turned to him with a scowl. "Oh, you jealous thing."

She spared one last apologetic smile to Zain as if to say she couldn't ignore Flash for too long, or she'd pay the consequences.

Within the hour they were ready and set off on the road. Lana had conceded to not knowing where they were going exactly whereas Leon took lead. No one argued, though her brothers seemed to want to (mostly Vincent), just to have anything to fight about.

Lana fell back in their traveling line, pleased just to watch her brothers hold a conversation with Leon even if she couldn't hear what they were saying. And even if she was fairly sure their tone would, if she was lucky, barely border civilized.

Zain ended up beside her. With his silence, she could almost forget he was there except for Nezumi's footfalls. As if feeling her gaze he looked up, "You did not say you could speak Yamani."

Lana was startled by the suddenness of it. "How would you know whether or not I speak Yamani?"

"You knew nezumi meant 'mouse'." He said as if it explained it all.

"What if it was one random word I knew among a few others?" She asked innocently.

It would be around this point that anyone else would have shown some sign of frustration. But Zain kept his cool, his calm never faltered. "Do you speak Yamani?"

Lana thought about that for a moment. Then deciding the truth was often better than not answered, "I know enough to carry a conversation. I understand more than I speak."

Emotions passed over his face before he turned his face away. The strongest expression she caught: confusion.

"Have I done something wrong, Zain?"

"No." The word was short, soft. She expected him to continue but he left it at that. She leaned over in the saddle as far as she could trying to catch a glimpse of his face.

"Tell me. I'm sorry whatever I have done, but I would like to know." Lana's words were gentle but carefully neutral.

He let out a breath. She could see his profile now, he was smiling and barely shaking his head. Even as small as his smile was the dimple on his left cheek showed. It was the kind of dimple that would have left a crease or wrinkle on his face if he smiled too much. Something told her he didn't smile enough for that. But the smile he wore now spoke of something only he could understand, something no one else would fine amusing. She didn't bother to ask.

As suddenly as before he turned his very light gray eyes to her. Her breath caught in her throat. Distantly, she was sure she should be embarrassed for being caught staring but she couldn't bring herself to be. Or rather she couldn't tear her eyes away.

Lana realized she had been wrong the day before when she'd thought he was handsome. His looks didn't allow handsome, not really. He was . . . beautiful. She would never say it aloud, no man took being called 'beautiful' well. She swallowed and let out a shaky breath. She hadn't expected to be hit so suddenly by his looks.

Lana couldn't name exactly what it was. His dark hair pulled back into a tight braid that could be confused with black if they hadn't had her hair to compare it to, the dimple showing on his left cheek, the look in his eye, or any number of facial features but it was true. He was beautiful.

A frown formed between his brows. "Are you well?"

She blinked. Surely he was used to getting looks like the one she was sure was on her face at this moment. Maybe he's trying to be kind to my pride. Though a very small thought said, maybe he isn't used to getting looked at like this. To which another part of her mind questioned, why not?

She nodded to his question, not willing to trust her voice at that moment. Lana even mustered up a smile to prove her point.

Zain shook his head as if to rid himself of some unwanted or unwelcome thought.

When they finally reached the town Lana found it was not much bigger than the one they had left the day before. Except this one had less businesses and more homes. There was one inn in the entire village. They had settled down at the inn with enough day left for Lana's thoughts and plans to get away with her.

Presently, she sat contented as a cat after a pitcher of milk. Two full servings of food and the sluggishness that usually came with a full belly settled on her.

Leon looked at her with a slight look of disgust, Zain: somewhat surprised but nothing else. Her brothers seemed more amused by the two men's reactions than anything else.

Leon spoke first, "Where does she put it all?"

Lana laughed. She stood without answering and stretched. She took one last gulp of her drink. "Well, boys, I'm off."

"Where?" Damien made it a standard question.

"Out of here." She said simply, "Out those doors and you can't stop me from that."

"Why?" Damien pushed on.

Lana rolled her eyes with a sigh. "Because what is the point of going to another place if you don't plan to . . . soak up the atmosphere?"

Damien let out a sigh of his own. "Just wait a moment and let one of us go with you."

Lana had a feeling that by 'one of us' he meant either Vincent or himself. Lana shook her head. "No, thank you. I'm quite alright." She smiled. "I'll only be taking a small stroll. Then tomorrow one of you can come with me."

"Tomorrow?" Vincent said. "We aren't leaving?"

"I wasn't planning on it." Lana answered. "We don't have a specific destination, its alright if we laze a bit."

Not waiting for any particular answer Lana nodded and left the inn without another word.

Outside Lana listened to the sounds. The wind blowing over the city roofs. Children laughing. Mother's scolding voices. Footsteps. Not too far ahead she could hear harsher voices but unless she concentrated she wouldn't be able to translate. Lana looked up at the sky, surprised in spite of herself that her brothers hadn't already followed her anyways.

Without noticing it, Lana had walked a fair distance. She turned around ready to walk back when something caught in her peripheral vision. Something moved, it was small and dark. Lana came close, walking between homes and bent towards it. When she touched it, it made noises of protest.

Lana looked upon it, "Oh, my."

A/N: Reviews would be helpful and appreciated! Thank you very very much!