Vassal by Sterling D'Este (ebook reader computer TXT) 📕

These nights are only going to get chillier as we climb higher into the mountains.”

Alphonse rolled onto her back in a swift motion, looking up at the tent ceiling.

“What if I snore?” she asked, ponderous tone bordering on worried. “That would be embarrassing…”

Delyth laughed, the sound rumbling through their small space.  What a strange thing to worry about! Still, it was so like Alphonse to stew over any inconvenience to those around her. “If you did, wouldn’t I already know?”

Alphonse blushed and shook her head. “I suppose you would… Do I?” She rolled onto her side to peer at Delyth across the way, reaching one hand out to touch Delyth’s shoulder lightly, affectionately.

“No,” she said and laughed. “Or if you do, it is so slight. Like a sound a bird might make, curled in its nest.”

“How do you know what sounds birds make in their nests?” Alphonse grinned and scooted over, patting the spot on her pallet that was now free. “They must think you are one of their kind.”

Delyth sat up and slid over, propping herself onto her side so that both she and Alphonse could lie on one pallet. Inches apart.

“If they do, then they must think me big and ungainly,” she said, chuckling. “They scatter when I am near. Even hawks and mountain eagles, though I think they are less frightened than just adverse to company. They are fierce, lonely birds.” She smiled at Alphonse and affectionately brushed a strand of tawny hair away from her face. “Do you think you would like to fly sometime?”

The healer shivered at that soft touch and closed her eyes. There was a crinkle in her lips that surely was a private smile. Laying so close, Delyth could hardly miss the gentle expression, and she felt her own cheeks warm, though she didn’t move to touch Alphonse again.It was too new, too fragile a thing.

“Is it very frightening? Being so high up?” the healer asked quietly, the soft darkness filling the tent heavy as a warm blanket.

“I don’t think so,” Delyth said honestly. “I think it feels like freedom. Maybe that's silly, but I just don’t know of any other way to describe it. It feels powerful and limitless—like you could go anywhere.”

“Maybe when… when this is all over.” The quiet between them was comfortable. Natural. “Your pretty hair is tickling my nose. Would it be rude if I laid on my other side?”

Delyth bit her bottom lip. She wasn’t used to anyone calling her pretty.

Especially not beautiful, kind women like Alphonse.

“Yes— I mean no, it's not rude,” she said, her voice a little hoarse. “That’s fine.” As the other girl rolled over, Delyth tentatively curled up around her. “Is this alright?” She hardly breathed the whisper. “For warmth.”

❀

“Yes.” Alphonse murmured, eyes already growing heavy. How could she be tired!? She had barely been awake an hour…

Whatever Enyo had been up to that day must have been exhausting.

Briefly, she wondered if her hair was now tickling Delyth’s nose, but couldn’t be bothered to move. The back of her skull rested against Delyth’s shoulder, and the taller woman’s body shielded her perfectly from the plummeting temperatures.

“I do miss your wings, though,” she mumbled into the darkness. Wrapped up in those gigantic membranes, Alphonse had always felt as if she were cocooned in some safe shelter, far away from the terrible reality of her life.

“They’ll be back by morning,” Delyth replied. “And I won’t hide them again anytime soon.”

“Good, I like you the way you are.” And Alphonse thought Delyth liked her the way she was too. Even with Enyo. It was a relief to have a female friend who accepted her as she came. In Moxous, many girls seemed to be close friends. Holding hands in the hallways, sitting next to each other in the libraries, giggling and whispering. But Alphonse had never experienced such companionship with other females.

She had always thought her friendship with Etienne was special and would go unsurpassed. After all, most of the girls at Moxous had at best thought her boring, and more often than not openly dismissed her. They never truly accepted her nor embraced her.

But now, with Delyth as her friend, Alphonse was starting to understand how much she had missed at school. How lucky she was now to experience this kind of kinship.

“Goodnight, Delyth,” she murmured faintly, already feeling the tendrils of sleep wrapping about her mind.

Delyth hummed into the crown of Alphonse’s head. “Good night, Alphonse.”

⥣          ⥣           ⥣

Alphonse hadn’t felt much like writing in her journal the first few weeks of their journey. It had seemed pointless to a degree, as her musings were often dark and self-loathing and had nothing to do with the art of healing. Students at Moxous were encouraged to keep daily journals of what they learned, their own personal thoughts of the subjects, and a log of activities in order to keep their minds well organized.

A habit instilled in them since the young age of eleven or twelve, Alphonse had been meticulously journaling all those years. Yet when Enyo had taken hold of her body, hold of her life… Alphonse had been lost. She struggled to find the way back to herself and so had dropped the habits that had kept her company for many years.

But with the addition of Tristan to their group, and with Enyo’s clear fondness for the man, Alphonse suddenly felt the urge to resume that which had been such an intricate part of her. Of Alphonse.

She had packed the journal, at the bottom of her sack, and there it had lain, undisturbed, for weeks.

But the morning after meeting Tristan, Alphonse found herself hauling the journal out, along with a charcoal pencil, and determinedly started to write down every fact and detail of her experience.

A student’s journal had started this entire mess.

She wanted to make sure her own journal might save someone else from suffering her fate: twenty, thirty, a hundred years from now.

So,