The next morning, Lon'qu went to visit Ke'ri once more. He noticed how familiar the long and winding path had become to him, how he had subconsciously memorized the landmarks along the path.

Ke'ri answered the door this time. "Oh! Lon'qu, it's you. What do you want? Did my dad's servants tell you about the house we found yet?"

He took a deep breath. "Yeah. Look, we need to talk about that. I think there's been a misunderstanding. Can I come in?"

"Sure. Let's go to my room, we can talk there."

She sat cross-legged on her bed and he sat on the floor, just like before. He liked leaning against her soft, feather-filled mattress, and settled back into a comfortable position.

"So what's up?" Ke'ri asked.

"When I accepted help from you before, I was under the impression that your father would loan us ten or fifteen gold. I never expected that he would pick out a house for us and pay for the entire thing!"

"Oh…well then, where were you planning on moving to? And how much gold do you want us to give you?"

"Loan me," he corrected, stressing the word. "But to be honest, I wouldn't mind taking your charity too much. It's mostly for my mother, who hates feeling indebted to anybody. I was hoping to move to Linan. There's too much in Wufen that I would like to leave behind me."

"Linan?" Ke'ri exclaimed. "But that's almost two hours away from here! Will I ever get to see you?"

He shrugged. "Sure you will. It's only two hours from here, and I'm sure you could just ride a horse on over. Then it'd be less than half an hour. Plus, I'll have to drop by when I come and pay you back whatever you've loaned us."

"Oh, stop it," she waved a hand at him. "Don't pay us back. It's the least we can do. And fine, I'll come and visit you from time to time."

"But first," he persisted. "Talk to your dad."

"I know, I know. Don't worry about it, I got it all covered. 'Lon'qu's family is moving to Linan and doesn't need us to pick out a house for them. Also they won't accept more than twenty gold from us so that's all we can give them,'" she recited in a bored tone.

"Hey! I said fifteen gold! But yeah, that's the gist of it," Lon'qu replied.

She giggled. "Okay then."

The silence stretched on for a little while.

"So…I better get going now," Lon'qu said, stretching out languidly. Even though leaning against the bed was so comfortable.

"Oh…okay. Come back tomorrow and I'll let you know what my father said?" she asked.

"Sure."

"So what are you gonna do now?"

"Arenas," he replied briefly. "I'm almost there, might as well go."

"But I thought the whole point of us helping you was that you wouldn't have to do that kind of stuff!" Ke'ri exclaimed.

"Well, it's not like I'll be able to find a one-time job for today, will I?" he replied.

"Do you always have to be making money?" Ke'ri asked. "Can't you just stay here and hang out with me? It's so boring, being an only child."

Even though he knew that she hadn't meant it, Lon'qu felt a flash of irritation at her. "Not all of us have so much money to spare," he replied, a little more heatedly than he probably should have.

And now the awkward silence was here again. Ke'ri curled up, hugging her knees to her chest. Why was it that she always picked the wrong thing to say?

"Look," she began uncertainly. She took a breath to continue, but her mind blanked. She should have thought out what she was going to say before speaking, she berated herself mentally. And suddenly, something within her snapped.

"Oh, whatever," she sighed loudly, throwing her hands up in the air. "I've always known that you've been annoyed by me, ever since the very first time we met for real. Sure, maybe you liked my singing, or whatever, but you obviously don't like spending time with me, the person. It was silly of me to try and force this friendship from the very beginning. And even sillier to try to basically bribe you into being my friend," she said. Her rapid-fire talking slowed as she realized just how unreasonable she had been. "I'm sorry, I really am. Just go. Sorry again for being so inconsiderate."

She bit her lip and looked away, eyes beginning to mist up with tears, and waited for him to leave.

Lon'qu stood there awkwardly, unsure of what to do. He reached out a hand, thinking to comfort her with a touch, then stopped, fairly sure that it would be the wrong thing to do. "Um…" She turned to look at him, tears threatening to spill out of her eyes.

Clenching and unclenching his outstretched hand, Lon'qu tried to figure out what to say. He hadn't meant to hurt her feelings so much! And this was the thanks he gave her after she had tried so hard to help him and his mother. Making a decision, he stood up abruptly and sat down beside her on the bed.

"I told you already, you don't need to force yourself to stay. We'll still pay for your new house, even if you decide to leave and never talk to me again," Ke'ri said, eyes downcast.

"I'm not leaving," Lon'qu replied decisively. "So maybe we had a bad start. Some miscommunication, a case of falsified identity – though that one wasn't my fault at all – some rash actions, and a few not-so-well thought out words. Let's start over."

"What are you talking about?" Her voice had lost its tremor, and now she simply sounded confused.

"I'm saying, let's start over. Hi. I'm Lon'qu. I'm from the Wufen slums, and I'm 17. It's nice to meet you." He extended his hand in the same Ylissean fashion that she had when they had first met.

Slowly, shyly, a smile began to spread across Ke'ri's face. She grasped his hand and shook it firmy. "And I'm Ke'ri, daughter of consulate Shuo'li. It's a pleasure to meet you."

A/N: I'm always like "hey lets write romance" but then I remember "wait i dont know anything about romance so here goes nothing". Also, I just realized that in tharja's supports lon'qu says that Ke'ri is a village girl. Oops...