Stick to Your Side of the Hall

[Deleted]

[ Made for Anemone Sellar ]

Dragan Falco, royal guard of the now dead king, stalked through the castle with a bent brow and stiff form. He had things on his mind, and unfortunately no way to work through them. Not right now, anyway. Though he'd cultivated a friendship with the king, he didn't have many other pals to sit and have a drink with. Plenty of acquaintances, sure, but none with whom he could divulge the burdens of his mind.

Instead, Dragan was determined to walk and to deliberate on his own. The topic? Home.

The guards throughout the castle were on high alert these days. Granted, the king had died away from the castle, but he had still died. Been murdered. It was a mistake that every guard who claimed to keep him safe had to account for.

It also left Dragan wondering if he ought to stay.

Granted, he hadn't been there when the king passed. He'd been home, dealing with the fallout of his brother passing away. Passing away. That made it sound so gentle, so easy. It was anything but. That was another thing on his mind, another thing he had no one to talk to about.

The man's pretty blue eyes jumped up from the stone floor before him in time to see the approach of a certain lady in waiting who had caught his eye. They had had something small, but something hopeful; it had been effectively crushed by the woman's sudden lack of interest.

There were so many unspoken things.

Dragan averted his gaze, content to let their paths take them past one another. That was the course she had chosen, after all. She had picked the king.

[Anemone Sellar]

Anemone couldn't detangle her feelings any more. They'd become a twisted mess of guilt and relief, each so tied into the other that she'd been going in circles worrying about it all night and only managed to make herself even sicker--she hadn't even made it until sunrise before emptying her stomach this time. Was it still morning sickness if not even the sun was there to witness your misery?

They'd managed to make it through the funeral and burial, and the accidental party they'd created after had been almost a relief...at least until she had been left alone again to realize that she might not be able to attend a real party again. Not once her pregnancy began to show.

This morning she wandered the hall listlessly, her sleepless night more than evident in the circles under her dark eyes. She looked like a ghost of her former self with her hair hanging loose over her shoulders and mourning clothes washing her out even farther.

When she saw Dragan approaching, she stopped cold without quite realizing she'd done so until he was almost within arms reach. She had heard he'd left for something to do with his brother, but that was as much as she knew. She hadn't been entirely sure he'd come back at all, now that Edward had died. Seeing him now, watching him avoid her eye, made her want to weep all over again.

She'd thought they were friends, perhaps, until the king had...done what he did. Afterward she had been too shaken to speak with anyone, let alone one of the king's guards who surely knew what he'd done to her. How he'd trapped her. She'd been bitterly hurt. But now, with Edward safely in the ground, she wished she could have her life back.

Now Dragan was just brushing past, and the chance would be gone forever.

She didn't know what she was going to say, but she reached out to him as he passed, gently interrupting him with a hand on his arm. It would be easy enough for him to ignore her, if he liked. Her voice as she called out to him was as thin as air.

"My Lord, wait."

[Deleted]

No, Anemone had never been Dragan's friend. From the moment he'd laid eyes on the dainty woman with the sun in her hair he'd been captivated by her quaint beauty and gentle demeanor. In the months that followed he had sought to befriend her, engaging her in conversation at each encounter, leaving little treats and other various things she had mentioned she'd liked. Dragaon wasn't sure how serious he'd been--not serious enough to do something about the engagement the king thrust him in with another woman, but serious enough to not spend any time with that other woman...

But then the king had set his gaze on Anemone, and whatever unexplored thought about a potential future with the young noblewoman had been dashed. What was more, the king had hurt her, and there was nothing Dragan could do about it.

So yes, he attempted to pass her. She had picked the king, but likely because the king had picked her. There was nothing more for them now. It would be better if he could avoid her, rather than watch her suffer while entangled in the monarch's grasp. Even now, though he was dead, he could see the grease from his hands on her skin...

Dragan stopped when her hand caught his arm. He turned to her, looking down at the contact, then to the young woman. He dipped into a shallow bow.

"My lady...can I assist you?" Professional. Direct. Formal. All the things they were now...right?

[Anemone Sellar]

Anemone recoiled as if she'd been burned, the dismay clear on her face for just a moment before she managed to smile, although it wasn't very convincing. The way he'd looked at her hand as if it were an insect and the distance in his tone told her she'd made a mistake. She was too far from what she had once been. Should she just let him go? It would probably be best. But then she'd have put herself through this for nothing, and surely it was more strange to stop him and then change her mind. She recovered enough to give him a slightly deeper curtsy than needed, despite her reeling mind.

"I-I-" she stammered, fumbling for an actual reason to speak with him. "I wondered how your travels were. Your family, are they well?"

She clasped her hands in front of her waist and straightened her shoulders, endeavoring to play the part of a grown woman who could handle herself in court. She was simply being attentive to an acquaintance, as all good courtiers should. This would be simple, and he could answer her simply, and be on his way.

[Deleted]

Did Dagan wish he could drop the formality? Would he have liked to maybe pat her, or even hug her? Certainly. But he didn't. He had determined as soon as her relationship with the king had begun that he wouldn't do anything to make it harder for him. He didn't have a clue about how Anemone felt about him, and he wasn't willing to risk it. He was engaged, after all. Regardless of whether he actually intended to follow through with the dead king's wishes, he could still be a man of valor.

"Thank you for asking." Dagan said, letting his gaze pull away from her and to the ground first, then down the hall. "Actually, my brother died." His eyes flickered back to her. While the kingdom had been losing a king, Dagan had been losing his beloved brother.

He hadn't intended to let it show, but the sorrow came quickly to his face. He didn't cry, but his eyes were certainly wet, and he swallowed hard.

[Anemone Sellar]

Anemone gasped and almost put her hand on his arm again in an attempt to comfort him, but when she remembered how he'd just reacted, she pulled herself back. She didn't want to be intrusive.

"My goodness, that's terrible. I'm so sorry for your loss, and for my insensitivity--I had no idea." she blurted out in a rush. She truly meant it--the only death she'd experienced was that of the king, and frankly it hadn't caused her any sorrow over his departure from this world. Her pain was all from his life--but that didn't stop her from

She saw Dragan's eyes shine with tears, and though she didn't wish to embarrass him, she drew a clean handkerchief from a hidden pocket in her skirts and offered it to him. Perhaps he might be irritated with her for acknowledging his tears, but she saw no reason to let that stop her from being compassionate. After all, he was clearly in pain over the loss of his brother, and broken friendship or not, cold shoulder or not, she wasn't going to ignore that. Perhaps that would have been better etiquette, but she didn't particularly care.

"I promise, it's clean," she told him with a soft smile. "I've been carrying an extra, in case the queen or someone needed it."