She had been more than a little surprised when her brother had come with an invitation to the traveling markets. She'd thought he'd been angry with her and her last attempt at escape. As a matter of fact, she knew he was beyond doubt, and yet he wouldn't simply let her go either. She had refrained from further drawing hus ire. It made no sense to her. The disdain he fixed her with despite her best attempts to not be a burden, and yet he heeded their father's word. It was admittedly difficult to escape the piercing attention of his stare, regardless of her efforts.

She only hoped the sway of a crowd would aid her endeavors.

She had eagerly accepted his offer, any excuse to free herself from the eaves of that damned prison. However, she had found actual joy in the outing thus far. It reminded her of something. Something like you. The smell of various food and drink drew her attention, but it was ultimately the hymn of music that reigned her the most firmly. She would toss one of the precious few coins she had into the fiddler's hat, clapping as he finished his last song. The gentleman bowed with a theatric flourish, bidding a soft bubble of girlish laughter from her lips. A sound that would fade, along with the pluming simper upon her mouth as she glanced for the brooding blonde over the lithe curve of her shoulder. "C-can I learn th-that? Mother said y-you were looking for m-me a tutor."

He'd been quiet. Distant. Not that he'd been close since she could remember. Not that she remembered far. Her expression nearly faded until she caught the faint quirk of his mouth upwards. However, it didn't catch in his eyes. She didn't allow that to deter her. She'd made up her mind. Up until she would attempt to escape once again, she would try to brighten his spirits. He had seemed utterly miserable, and while she largely blamed herself and his charge of being her glorified baby sitter, she would try to alleviate any added displeasure. It wasn't his fault. No matter how she wished he would save her. No matter how she wished she had that bond displayed in the paintings with him, she simply had to face the fact that she did not.

He thought her greedy, and if she had been in the past, she could only make her efforts to remedy such a curse. Honestly, gold was at the back of her thoughts. It mattered painfully little to her, and she had a hard time swallowing his accusation that she was gleeful to be married into the cardinal sin of it. She merely had to prove it to him. That she had changed. That she had shed that shackle. Besides, there was no sense in the both of them being miserable. In the end, she would leave the home they shared with their parents and he would only return to the battle field. While she stayed away.

It was another thought that occurred to her. She couldn't help the way she caught some of the guards staring. Not entirely hatred, but a clear disdain. They boasted different colors than those of Odersten, and as he came closer, it was only his voice that distracted her from the way her skin crawled at their presence. “I’m sure you could.” His smile returned, the cruel one that she had become somewhat familiar with. “If your fingers don’t stutter like your tongue.” Before she could quip back, his hand found hers. His fingers not simply clasping her wrist, but intertwining within her own. Quicker than she could avert her stare, her features reddened. Unable to hide her embarrassment regardless as the flush found its way to heat her ears and all the way to the collar of her dress. She opened and closed her mouth several times, the only sounds garbled beyond recognition and merely punctuated with the occasional I.

Giving up in some sorry attempt to save herself from some of the harsh teasing she knew would come, she merely began walking. He didn't offer resistance, merely following behind her, and it left her occasionally glancing at him from the very corners of her eyes. She was certain he'd have a very set route to take, that she was only being taken since Father had forbidden her from leaving his sight upon her return to the estate. Her free hand found its way back to her jaw, the one he had stuck with enough force to make her ear ring for hours, making her fear she would never hear from it again. The red stains of shame remained upon her features until he would break his silence once more. “What...” She would halt, momentarily in her directionless march. Stopping to look at him cautiously. She had to think of something, assuming that he was about to inquire about her target. She had yet to find anything that caught her eye. Instead, came the softer inquiry. “What was your life like in the desert?  Before they brought you here.”

Oh. Her stare would fall, as if searching the path at her feet would give her some answer to give him. One that was interesting. "I-I...." She shrugged, dismissive, her fingers going limp within his own. "I don't remember much." The frown that etched her mouth was deeply ingrained in her words. For no reason, she felt almost like she had to bite back bitter tears. The very same that occasionally dampened her lashes in the mornings when she woke."I remember waking up. And I went... I-I went to the city by the p-port." Her free hand would again raise from her side, but this time it only brushed away the stray droplet that traced down her face. "I went there to wait f-for someone." She laughed, the sound light, incredulous at the recollection, or rather the shattered and broken remnant of it. To remember it would mean she knew who and why, but she didn't. Only that it was the only thing that her fractured cerebrum could focus on. Cling to. Like a light in the depths of an overly long tunnel she'd been plunged into. "But I don't rem-m-member who. Maybe Mother and Father. I guess." Another shrug. "J-just that they would c-come back for me."

She shook her head, ruefully. Brushing aside the poor explanation with another light laugh, as if it made her more of a person. As if it didn't just make her an impressionable shell easy to mold when there was nothing remaining of its former inhabitant. As if the horror of it hadn't been crushing her recently. She just smiled. She smiled. And she laughed. "Stupid, isn't it?"

There was surprise as his hand tightened around hers. She was not so dull as to believe that she had yet made any worthwhile progress in proving that she was not as gluttonous as he had so cleanly cut her out to be. Regardless, it made her want to remember. Even if they were just like everything else in that house, she wanted to recall what they had in paintings. She had studied them closely in her time alone, and after consideration, she could not fathom that simple artistic liberty could recreate the fondness in their gazes when they beheld each other. She wanted that back, she wanted the bond of family to return to her that had been stolen. That sentiment had her throat tightening painfully, as if it went far deeper than the surface of her skin. She had been robbed, wronged. It wasn't fair. 'Many things in life are not fair, Arabella.'

She shivered, a light shudder that rolled down the length of her spine, though it was not from the cold. It was more like a phantom pain, but it did not trace the ugly scar that marred the whole of her back. The hand he so gently squeezed reverberated with the sensation once again. Her brow furrowed and the gracious beam of her smile faltered, not all at once, but like it was being dismantled slowly. It wasn't until he reached out a hand towards her face that she realized she was crying. Not the same wailing sobs that had possessed her when she first awoke among the dunes. This was quiet, unnoticeable. He brushed away the stray path of another trekking tear. "What's stupid about it?  Stupid that you waited, or stupid that you left?" She simply stared at him, her eyes wide, her countenance empty otherwise.

Perhaps both. Though she could give no answer now. The path she had blazed for herself there, the simple existence of an empty husk would have lead to death's arms, but at the same time, she'd have died free. She wouldn't be plagued by brief flashes, images of a life she no longer lead and could not remember. She wouldn't be haunted by ghosts that only appeared in reflections of broken mirrors. When she thought she would finally reach them, it merely turned into another twisted fragment rather than truth. Always present, but so consistently dancing just beyond her grasp. One that was presently being guided forward once again.

Now it was her turn to follow, but she wasn't left to silence. "I suppose you wouldn't remember us going to the desert with Father," she looked up to him, falling into stride next to him with a slight hurry to her steps until she walked by his side. Her fingers finally finding themselves once more and lightly gripping his. "-when he was attending to his business with the natives there." Was that it? Why she was atimes there, standing among the dunes? Proudly defiant of the elements? Fond was the kiss of the warm breeze, pleasantly gritty with the occasional caress of sand granules. "Sometimes I miss it." She swallowed hard, her stare flickering to him. It was unnerving, as if he had read the notes of her mind scrawled on a piece of paper. Was she that transparent? However, it gave her strength, it gave her certainty. They weren't just dreams. Perhaps they weren't just dreams conjured from a frenzied throe of her cerebrum trying to piece itself together like their parents claimed. She had kept them so quiet lately, afraid to share them with anyone, anything. Because when she remembered, she was sent away to see the doctor. So that she could be fixed. It was a relief to simply feel validated finally. "There was something about that place... it called to me back then.  Do you ever wish you could go back?"

He stopped, and she did as well, but she didn't meet his stare at first. Her heart raced, thrumming violently within her chest until she feared it would force its way from betwixt her breast. She wasn't alone in those recollections. hardly ever was she cast to solitude in those dreamscapes, but no matter how hard she tried, their faces would not come to her as easily as their words - and even those were skewed and sprinkled with disarray. "Yes." Her reply was soft, and she wasn't certain at first if she had spoken at all. Finally, her eyes found his, her expression a mixture of furrowed brow and slight simper. "I think... I think I-I miss those days." Her free hand, the one lingering in her pocket would lock around her treasure. The only thing she had brought with her across the sea. The only thing that her mother couldn't force her to part with. She squeezed it until she thought the edges might break her skin. "The natives. T-tell me more. What were they like?" Despite herself, she couldn't keep the note of urgency from her tone.

It was wrong. Her answer was wrong.

Her heart fell as he looked at her, her features following suit as she nearly shied away from him. She knew what that malicious grin meant. He would verbally lash out at her again, perhaps even grab her once more as he had in the hall upon his return. Adrenaline flooded her veins. Her answer may have been wrong to him, but she knew now that she was not. That her mind wasn't as broken as her parents would have her believe. That resolve strengthened within her stare, her brow, the clench of her jaw. She wouldn't go back to the doctor again. If he told her secrets, those she had thought she'd been right to share with him, no force on this earth would make her darken that doorstep again.

But it didn't come.
The lashing she had braced for was absent.

Instead, it was worse. He had apparently glimpsed the bauble that she had lolled within her hand, and it currently held his attention. Their parents knew of it, for even as her mother had stripped her down to her bare and visible bones below the deck of the ship that bore her back, it was the one thing the woman could not force her to toss to the embrace of the sea. The ragged and stained garments of her attire had drifted from her sight as it was thrown from the window. She had watched the glimmer of decorative chains wink their final farewells to the sunlight as the silk had waved with the ebb and pull of the tide and the currents that lurked below. Until it was gone. Until the gold no longer sparked and ignited. Until the plum became one with the darkness of the fathoms. Everything, she surrendered. Everything but this one small thing.

"What is that you have?"

They knew of it, but she was still mortified to let any of them see it for the fear that they would try to rend it from her as well after all. Cautiously, she would allow the band to slip along her finger, which in turn clutched into a fist. Only then would she reveal it to him, ensuring that if he also wished her to part from it, he could not snatch it from her with ease. "It's the only thing I have." Her words were even, but slow, a guarded emphasis that it was hers. That it belonged to she and she alone. That he would not take it.

However, he would begin to move again, and she was quick to redeposit her free hand into her pocket. "There was a girl that Ar-" She would tilt her head, her stare narrowing upon him. There was something there in her chest like coals, not yet a burning flame, but stoked to become one. It was a dangerous feeling, one that warred with the tenderness that co-existed in that very same place. Part of it had been fed to the embers, an instinct for survival. "Arranged accommodation for us." He cleared his throat, and her eyes left his, trailing to his mouth as he spoke again. "This girl, Daesn'yri, was their princess and we had grown very close with her and her people even though Father didn't approve of it.  Compared to us, they were... feral, I suppose, but not at all cruel.  They were welcoming and excited when they saw us.  Did you not see them at the docks?" She didn't miss the way his stare ghosted to her and she would avert her own, a flush coloring her cheeks.

Her brow furrowed. Her temples seared as she tried to force herself to recall. Such a thing seemed true, and she could undoubtedly remember time being spent there. It was all that ever plagued her in the terrors of the night. But that was always blood. Blood and gore painting those gilded dunes red. The recollection jarred her, and she would turn her eyes upwards to the darkening skies. "Tents." She murmured the word, nodding reaffirmation to herself. "I-I remember the huts. The b-bonfire. The bonfire!" She released a giddy laugh, one that seemed overbearingly loud in the hushed babble of the crowds and she gripped his hand tighter. "A b-big man! A big man with such long hair. Like s-starlight!" She spoke as if this was a great accomplishment, the greatest discovery of her time, and her simper was one of satisfaction. However, as she tried to think of if she had seen any of them at the port, she would shake her head. "I did n-not." Her expression turned thoughtful. "I only heard rumors as people w-walked by on the pier. P-people said the wolf queen was dead. Apparently that meant something to them."

He didn't try to take it from her, much to her relief. Not even a word escaped his lips, a simple soft sigh that eluded her in meaning. He seemed.... surprised. Perhaps he was, or maybe it was just the masquerade of interest put on display to placate her of her most precious possession. Regardless, it mattered not to her as her thumb ran along the smooth band in seeking comfort.

She couldn't bear to part with it, not for any reason under the sun that she could fathom. Not when it was the only warm thing in a place so cold and seemingly foreign. It was somewhat comforting, the acceptance that came from him that their parents had been void of. It was almost like what she had wanted in that first visit he had come home in. What she had wanted since she came here. It was hard to describe, to experience with clarion thought and rationality. Those first several days, perhaps a week after she had been found had been, by far, the worst. Her voice had been raw, cracked from lack of use and even though she could understand what people had been saying all around her - from the docks til now - she had been unable to answer.

Was she still waking up?

He offered a slight laugh as well at her recollection, recalling the fondness of the man he finally gave a name to. "Chief Ravsk'yri was a terrifying man." His hand squeezed hers, gently, reassuringly. However, her eyes would fall slightly, searching the dirty street between their feet. That name was one that had always been fresh upon her tongue, and yet unwilling to move forward. Knowing it now was like a weight upon her shoulders rather than one being lifted and she heaved a sigh as if she was going to say something and then thought better of it as he continued. "But he loved you very dearly.  Ah, you and Daesn'yri." She looked back to him then from under the scrutiny of a furrowed brow. Then they had spent quite a bit of time there, it wasn't simply a place briefly encountered, or where she had been mystical whisked off to. Then why was it that was the story so insisted upon by their parents? Why did they lie to her? Or was this just some manner of cold, cruel joke he was playing on her?

"I imagine it meant a lot to them," he continued, and she would meet his stare, "because the king had begun capturing the tribespeople en masse to serve as slaves." Yes, a part of her knew that to be true, though she didn't remember it, the instinctual disdain that it brought with her was enough to garnish it as fact. It was the very same as the disgust that welled within her chest at the thought of being sold off into marriage. One that he allowed, one that he did nothing to stop and even aided in keeping her prisoner under the guise of safety. Though, his next words would somewhat explain the very situation. "Father originally went to sell weapons to their king but realized that helping the tribespeople was more profitable in the long run." She scoffed, the sound one that would have made Miss Babington flinch and wail of her unladylike behavior. Perhaps she would have even washed her mouth out with soap. "Good to see that little has changed." The comment was accompanied by a snide simper, one that narrowed her eyes and crinkled the bridge of her nose with obvious disdain.

Her earlier suspicion of his venomous humor faded, at least somewhat. No, he seemed far too genuine about this, and something was off about him as well. Something changed from the young man who had come home so malicious to her at each and every turn. She cleared her throat, lips parting once more before shutting in consideration. It wasn't until she settled on what she was going to ask him that she finally piqued once more, her tongue laced comfortably with the language she had heard so freely on the pier. If they had spent as much time there as he claimed, and if she knew it, surely he would know it then too. Otherwise, she would take him to be a liar. "Whui ceri- hain lie na nin?" She would tilt her head at him, observing from that still pulled brow and thinly veiled gaze, her arms crossed over the swell of her chest as her hip cocked slightly - annoyance bleeding from her every fiber as they stopped.

Her demeanor shifted as he held the outfit up against her frame, however. Her cheeks flourishing a striking pink as he allowed his eyes to wander the veil of the thin material in line with her. Her stare averted, losing some of its harsh edge in light of such a strikingly different observation. It wasn't like the one he had given her in the estate hall before making the comment that she could do without a meal or several. A recollection that had her pursing her lips. She wouldn't allow her sights to drift back to him again until he placed the garment back. "Pick one of these." She would blink at the issued command, allowing her head to tilt once again as she truly looked at the outfit. It reminded her vaguely of the filthy fabric her mother had peeled from her bodice when they had bathed her on the boat. "He won't like it." She informed, her voice soft. "F-father, I mean." Her fingertips rubbed the silk betwixt them as the shop keeper eyed her with as much suspicion as she had Aethelos previously. The very same that she would cast her attention to again, a slight smile painting her expression, curiosity lining her vocals as she pulled one of the strap towards her.

"Did you think this one would look nice?"