Aydra felt the color drain from her face. Her brows raised, and her weight shifted.
“I’m sorry, what?” she asked, now hugging her arms over her chest.
Nadir laughed again. “Lovi Piathos. Giver of the Honest people. Lesser One and child of the Ghost of the Sea. But here at the Umber, we call him the Grand.”
If there had been a chair behind her, she would have sat. But there was no chair, and so she was stuck making herself stay on her feet like a frightened child.
She wasn’t sure what she had expected upon meeting him. A warrior, perhaps. A tall strong man of beauty and grace, who’s skin looked of the glittering sea.
The very last thing she had expected was an older man with a tall staff to help him walk.
“Don’t let the staff fool you,” Nadir said in a hushed voice. “He doesn’t really need it. Just thinks it makes him look wiser—Ow!”
Lovi had smacked him in the shin with the end of his staff. The high-pitched laugh emitted from Lovi, and he turned with two potions in his hand to mock Nadir.
“Mock and pay,” he said with another laugh. He looked to Aydra then and nodded towards a chair on the other side of the tent. “Sit, my dear.”
Aydra snapped out of her daze and made her way to the chair. Lovi stood over her, pouring some of the potion onto ribbons. She winced when he pressed it to the wound on her arm.
Lovi started asking Nadir about the battle as he dressed her wound. He told him about the ships and what they’d found, the weapons they’d used. Lovi asked about the plan they’d used to ambush, and Nadir grinned at Aydra.
“Actually, if it hadn’t been for the Sun Queen here, I’m not sure we would have won with the numbers we did,” he affirmed.
“I’m sure you would have figured out something,” Aydra argued.
“Bickering like the last time,” he muttered. “It’s nice to have fresh eyes on the field once in a while.”
Nadir left them a few moments later, leaving Aydra in the room with only Lovi’s company. She shifted nervously as he cleaned the wound on her arm, followed by the cut on her cheek, but his calm energy made her feel more open to speaking truthfully with him than even her own mother.
“Tell me, little Sun. How your mother?” he asked after a few minutes.
“Oh, you know Arbina,” she said, shaking her head. “High. Mighty. Manipulative… All the things she says we aren’t to trust about every other race in this land.”
Lovi chuckled under his breath. “Not have I heard another speak about her like this since Duarb was able to walk the ground.” His cerulean eyes met hers, and he paused. “What she says such to make you think this?”
Aydra sighed and ran a hand through her hair. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t speak ill of my giver. It was rude of me.”
“Hole open,” he bantered. “You spill.”
She scoffed as he started blotting her wound again. An elongated sigh left her lips, and she stared at the ground as she began to admit words to him she’d not shared with another living being.
“Everything I’ve ever learned about the other races of Haerland has been proven wrong to me in just the last few months,” she admitted. “I don’t know what to trust. I was hurt in the Venari kingdom during the deads a few months ago. Draven and his people aided me back to health, no questions asked. When I spoke with my mother about it, she told me the reason I’d fallen in the first place was that the Venari had orchestrated it.” She paused and met Lovi’s narrowed gaze, and she shook her head as the memory of her mother’s words radiated through her. “I know she is wrong, but when I accused her of it, I thought she would murder me right then.”
Lovi chuckled under his breath. “Your mother always been strong-willed, yet terrified of everything,” he said, wrapping a bandage around her forearm. “She always believed everyone after her. She has reasons.” He tied the bandage off then and took her hand. “You trust instinct, Sun daughter. And if ever you want full truth of our past, come back to Umber. I take you to the Honest Scrolls.”
She swallowed hard as she met his gaze, and then gave him a nod. “Thank you.”
“Hey, Sun Queen—” Nadir burst through the tent door again, carrying a pair of boots in his hands. “Will these fit?”
Aydra had forgotten about her absent shoes. She took the shoes from his hands and pushed them on her feet. Lovi’s chortle echoed in her ears again, and then he reached out for her hands.
“Meet again soon, Sun daughter,” he said, kissing her knuckles.
Lovi disappeared through the curtain door a few moments later. Nadir had brought her a simple black cotton dress to change into as well, as her own clothing was covered in blood and sand. He waited for her outside the tent as she changed.
When she emerged, his brows raised, and he nodded in her direction. “Not bad,” he mused, to which she shook her head. He grinned at her. “Black is your color isn’t it?” he asked.
“Is there a darker noir I should know about to match my core?” she bantered.
