The World of Rhune

Karillian paced the room; it wasn’t natural. Her brother should be back here by now, chastising her and putting her fears and rages to rest. He should be grinning at her impatience, or puking on the toilet if a recap of last night was happening. She’d even taken the time to set up towels around the stupid pot incase he had a recap. Kari shook her head. Her brother, twin, should be here, scratching something into his journal, leaving blank spaces for her horrible handwriting. He should be out cold, like she wanted to be, but adrenaline and worry kept her up, worry about him. Zayde Keresche Delliuh, you are so dead when your ass walks through that door. Karillian paced the length of the room again. She was trapped inside, the person who wanted the freedom the most, and he was dancing his merry way somewhere outside the room that had started to look horribly decorated. She could see the slight flaws in fabric and tiles, and how the colors were really not her favorite. She missed her warm browns and uplifting blues. Karillian fingered the wrapped braid in her short hair for the millionth time, a habit that had formed in less than an afternoon. She looked up at the sundial near the window. Ten o’clock, it read. “Where are you?” Kari said to herself, and debated going to Trei to see if he could find her brother. She wondered if Trei would even be in his room, but decided she’d give her brother until eleven before she truly freaked out. The princess walked over to the couch and sat down, staring at random objects. The desk table, the flowers that had started to barely wilt on one side while the other was perfectly crisp. How the door had a particular design on the bottom, and the top was different. The love seat across from her with it’s depressed magenta fronds, despite how straight and up the seat itself looked. Kari’s eyes flashed up to the sundial. It had been five minutes since the last time she looked. Uh, Zayde…where are you! She felt like yelling. But naturally, she’d have to trade his name for Demetrey. Uh, I do hate that name, too bad Zay’s in love with it. He might as well marry it while he’s at it. Karillian walked to the window and stared out into the dark yard. She could see the guards standing watch, after five minutes she caught a maid scurrying and then shouting at a guard. She assumed the maid had been harassed. Kari shook her head, and wondered what her life would have been with Sunste. Probabaly miserable. She’d be demoted in more than one category. She’d become the wife of just a high ruler in the Xirrian society, which would strip her of every freedom she’d probably known. Even maybe that of reading, she’d heard from one of her ladies in waiting that a cousin had been stripped of that right. It would be horrible, too, just to have Sunste as a husband. To have him around her all time, and to live on some island isolated from the world. Sure, it would probably be glamorous and beautiful, but it would still always be a prison. It occurred to Kari briefly that her parents and Sunste probably would have gone to extremes and drugged her if it was the only way to force her to the altar. She doubted there would be an audience besides a page, priest, and her parents. The princess walked away from the window, and laid down on the love seat, letting her imagination get away from her. She’s probably shriek for hours on end after she ‘awoke’ from the drug, until someone slapped her, which then she’d attack whoever had touched her. They’d probably then tie her wrists up, or send her into a cell, until she was sent away from Caryi to Xirra to live the rest of her miserable life. She wondered briefly if he… “Katya stop it,” Kari commanded herself. It was a life that wasn’t going to be hers anymore. There was no way for Sunste to find or capture her. Well, there is, since he’s in the same freakin’ castle I’m hiding in! Karillian wondered whether Sunste knew that, and he was just humoring the prince. She remembered clearly the arrogant, upset way Trei had entered the room after his meeting with the lord, but Trei seemed like he wouldn’t be the one to let a single guard patrol his wing of the castle, even if it was to put to rest Sunste’s mind. Zayde where are you? I need to kick someone’s butt right now, distract myself, and right now your ass is up on my kicking list. She imagined his eyebrow lifting, and him questioning “Kicking list?” Yes, my kicking list, and again, your butt is first on the list.