She huffed a sound like a mix between a scoff and a laugh, rolling her eyes as she took another drink before handing back his canteen. She was still occasionally coughing. "Yes, I noticed. I guess that means I owe you a secret then."
“Yes. Any secret under the rules we established.” He grinned brightly and slid forwards, tilting his head. “You don’t have to say it very loud. It’ll be between just you and I.”
His grin drew a smile to her own lips, even as she furrowed her brow in thought. "There is one that might be of importance that I could share, or I could share one that isn't quite as important." She said, tilting her own head in the opposite direction of his.
He leaned forwards, the light catching his silver eyes and making them shine. If one only got to know about the Valdorian race, they would know instantly that the silver was the mark of royalty.
“I’ll give you the freedom of choosing which to tell me, Amira. I’m not a cruel man.”
"Your eyes look like pools of starlight." She commented absent-mindedly, her own eyes flickering up to study his and the effects the light had on them. "I'll tell you the first one. The second can wait." Having the choice itself was probably what allowed her to make that decision, the knowledge that she only had to if she wanted to. "It's about the alcohol. I am scared of alcohol, but I am terrified of drunken people. Not too long ago….I was jumped, in an alley outside a tavern by a group of men so drunk they could barely even see straight." She looked up, up at the sky as her face closed off again. The only way she could talk about it. To detach herself from it.
A light pink dusted his cheeks at her words, a soft sigh leaving his lips. “Thank you… I personally don’t like them.” He admitted, chuckling.
When she began to explain her secret to him, he fell silent, listening to her carefully. “They didn’t do anything to you did they?” He asked sharply, baring his teeth at the thought of someone touching Amira the wrong way.
Amira huffed a breath of air, a wry sound that may have been a laugh. She let the silence answer for her for a few moments, a definite 'yes, yes they did', before speaking again. "I can't even walk past a tavern or bar anymore. I find a way around, even if it takes me well off my path. Definitely unfortunate, is it not? Especially with how common they are in populated cities."
There was a soft growl from his throat. His hands seemed to tighten a little but he soon calmed himself and looked up at her. “I won’t drink around you or be around you when I am drunk. You have my word.” He dipped his head down, teeth clicking in anger. “Us men are disgusting.” He huffed. “We only want what satisfies us and we don’t care how we take it.”
She furrowed her brows in surprise at the growl that came from him, eyes flickering down and meeting his in confusion. He was mad. What for? And then he was talking again, before she could as, and Amira couldn't quite believe it. Eyes wide, she reached out, placing a hand on top of his lightly. "You don't-have to make me that promise. I did not tell you this to force you into leaving behind something you need, for coping or enjoyment or whatever it is. I told you so that you would know something important."
Nordali’s eyes flashed dangerously when she first touched him, but he immediately stood down and relaxed his form. “I can deal with a little less booze, Amira. I honestly shouldn’t be drinking at all. A leader who drowns himself in alcohol… it’s not a good thing.” He shifted into a more comfortable position for himself, casually moving closer to her.
Nor found comfort somehow in her soft presence. She stirred something in him he couldn’t place. He almost didn’t like feeling it, because it left him vulnerable. And yet it was nice, warm, and welcoming.
"A leader who drowns himself in alcohol has his issues. But a leader who recognizes those issues is one step closer to mending them. I don't want to force you into that mending though, hallaski. The choice should only ever be yours." Amira almost sounded desperate, to make him listen, like the idea of forcing somebody to do anything was horrible to her. Her hair was back in her face, curly strands falling into her eyes no matter how she moved to get rid of them.
He brought a hand up to gently brush those strands of hair out of her eyes, tilting his head. “I understand. You won’t force me into it don’t worry Amira. I will work on it, however.” He smiled softly at her; this one looked more genuine and reached his eyes.
“Thank you for telling me. I can promise you that you will not be touched by any hand here with malicious intentions. You are protected here.” Nordali took her hand and brought her palm to his lips in a kiss. “It is tradition in my kingdom to seal a promise in this way. It is symbolic that you hold my word, my voice in your hand. If I break it, I lose what you hold.”
A light blush reached her cheeks as he brushed her hair back, the return of physical contact, especially so soft, always something she'd struggled with being casual about. And his smile…Prophets, she really did love seeing him actually smile. Something about the expression sparked a fluttering in her gut, like butterfly wings brushing one's fingers, but even more substantial.
"That means so much more to me that you could possibly know." She said softly, cheeks definitely red now. Between the kiss and the words, she was just slightly flustered. Slightly. "Should I not owe you the same, in that case? For my promise to help you lead, should you find yourself in need of my help?"
He chuckled lightly, tucking a strand of his dark hair up with the rest of it. Hair ties would have done him some good. The strip of cloth he used was rather troublesome.
“You don’t have to owe me anything, Amira. Your presence here is enough.” His soft smile fell from his face a little too quickly and his eyes flickered away from her’s. There was a small amount of embarrassment on his face. “I apologize if that was too much.”
"No, it's-you have not said or done anything one would consider 'too much'. Don't worry." She assured him quickly, slightly sad to see his smile go. It reminded her of the cherry blossoms in Kasosponia. Beautiful, but so fleeting, gone before you knew it. "I'm…glad my presence is something so great, though. I grew up told it was more of a nuisance than anything."
He returned his solemn eyes to a spot somewhere near her face, that blush still present on his cheeks. He felt if he looked at her she would see how it flared with her words. “Please, stop me if I ever am too much. I have… well, I have a hard time with myself.” He admitted, making a face at the bluntness of the statement. He was trying to protect his pride and hide the sudden soft spot he had grown. It wasn’t working very well.
“Oh! You’re not a nuisance at all! Quite the contrary, my lady! Very lovely to be around” he sputtered out before he could stop himself. His regal training was something his body and brain couldn’t forget. ‘My lady’ was a phrase drilled into him.
"You really shouldn't fret so much. You're perfectly wonderful as is." She said, smiling softly. She saw right through his words and attempts at hiding things, though that soft spot was still unclear in her mind. There was no reason for anyone to be fond of her, at least in her mind, because it had been drilled into her head that a ruler didn't have to make connections.
Her eyebrows flicked up at his sputtered words, the use of 'my lady' just a bit too familiar, but coming from him, from someone who had no clue what she was, it seemed almost…alright. She had hated the term, but he almost made it not horrible. "Lovely to be around? I wouldn't go that far to describe myself."
He laughed, lowering his head once more. His melancholy expression seemed to pick up, however. “Thank you.”
In the heat of his slight panic he lifted his hands to undo his hair, fiddling with its length and twisting it around his fingers. It was a nervous habit of his. “Well, I happen to think you’re very lovely.” He said, trying to cover up his bumble with proud words.
"Oh?" She tilted her head, hair once again returning to her face, though she seemed to have given up on trying to move it for the moment. "Is there a specific reason you think that?" It really was hard to believe that anyone saw her as lovely. A nuisance, strange, lacking of morals, all of these were more on brand for the princess.
He studied her for a long time before he shifted, hovering his hand over a patch of thin grass. The blades perked up and leaned towards his palm, curling around his fingers as it grew. “Nature has a certain feeling to it. I can sense the different undertones the environment around has. I’m… more heavily connected to life forces. My mother always wondered at my ability to connect with nature, told me it was a gift to be proud of. So, I’ve found my ability to read life forces has transferred to certain people. Yours is warm and soft, a little roughly shaped but still rather enjoyable. But I can only feel yours in short waves.”
She kept her eyes on his as he studied her, blinking and looking towards his hand as he moved it. When she saw the way the grass moved to meet his flesh, her eyes widened, a child-like look of excitement and awe coming across her face. Her own magic was so destructive, relying on death and forces that took and destroyed, but his…his played more with life, a softness she had never seen in magic up close before. Even as she listened, she was watching the grass happily, wistfully. "Warm and…soft? I figured anything like that would have been…harsh. Stormy and dark, like the magic running through my veins. What does that mean, 'short waves'? You say it like that is different, or something."
(Sorry for the wait I realized I had homework)
He smiled at her excited smile and took his hand back from the grass. It seemed to return quite hesitantly to its own business. "I do feel the storm too. But that's a different thing than your life-force." He explained, hesitating. "I never learned how to really use these… I can't quite describe some things yet. But I can tell you have some sort of power and it's a little separated, like you're not quite… connected to it at the moment?" He bit his lip and shook his head. "I don't understand what I feel. It's just… different. I can't sense yours all the time, it flares with something and I'm not sure if its emotions or just to its own beat. While any other person I've met has had consistent forces." He murmured, shifting his weight nervously. It was almost like he hated to speak about this part of him, the uncertainty and doubt in his own powers.
(also, I said disconnected because it says her powers sometimes work when she's in a specific mood so like when she's angry she has more control over the weather ya know? I can change that if you don't like it.)
((No, you’re absolutely right! That’s part of why she struggles with both of them so much, is her disconnect, lack of proper training, and her inability to view her powers as parts of her instead of separate things. I’ll get a response up once I’ve got the laptop, but I wanted to let you know you were right))
((Okay thank you! And take your time man.))
"I think it's a mix of both." She whispered, her expression falling slightly at some memory. The crown princess was given a tutor in magic, the court sorcerer, best in the kingdom, but he was…not a good teacher, to say the very least. "The things I can do could be great, if they were in the hands of somebody else. Somebody like you, who knows what they're doing, and is…comfortable with their magic." She sighed softly, turning her hands palm up on her knees and studying her hands. The thumb on her right hand was weirdly crooked, like it had been broken a couple times and not healed right, and there was a thick scar snaking down her wrist and forearm on the other arm. And the way she looked at her hands was with enough disgust to wither the most confident of people. "I have never in my life been able to control it. It does what it pleases, and hurts people in the process."