Since there were no inns or any other similar places in the village, they made their way to Rain's house, hoping the woman might offer them a solution regarding ZenTar's and VinWei's temporary accommodations. Even though in any other circumstances anywhere would have been fine, the truth was that neither had packed what was needed to camp outside, doing their best to travel as light as possible, since they had flown all the way there.
Rain's surprise at seeing another two people standing at her door was short-lived. Like most villagers, she had expected to see ZenTar appear at any moment. The beautiful, young woman that accompanied him, however, was immediately the target of a suspicious and unfriendly glare.
"This is VinWei," ZaiWin immediately offered, stepping forward, redirecting the older woman's attention to him. "She's a trusted friend. And she is a Jundai of the Temple," he added.
Not that that would make VinWei any more welcomed by the villagers. No one there cared one bit about the Temple. They had been the first ones to fill their pockets with coin and run away, a long time ago, when Nox had lost their Governor, abandoning the people in need to fend for themselves. But, exactly for that reason, accompanying the tale of such cowardly action, the Temple's people were always described as weak and spineless by the common folk. Just a bunch of priests and priestesses that did nothing but walk around in their long robes and kneel in prayer the entire day. The common people of Nox didn't like them, even more so if they were clearly of noble blood like VinWei, but they didn't consider them a threat either.
As to be expected, Rain snorted, averting her gaze, slightly tilting her head higher before she invited them in.
"And that stubborn man-bear of yours?" ZenTar asked, also clearly trying to make for more friendly conversation, and Rain sighed, shaking her head in silent condemnation.
"Upstairs. Asleep, I'd gather."
ZaiWin grinned evilly at that.
"They had this huge celebration, yesterday. When we came down this morning, he and Storm were both practically dead on top of the table."
Rain smiled gently, as if that were a fond memory.
"Celebration? What happened?" ZenTar immediately asked, knowing that it was rare for men like Grisly to get so wasted that they wouldn't be able to walk, much less hold a weapon, the following day, and Rain's eyes brightened up immediately, a huge smile glowing on her face.
"It would be a waste trying to describe it to you, Master Zen. I will let the little lord personally take you there, later on," she declared, sounding all proud, and winked at Snow, who immediately blushed.
"What take me there? Take me where?" ZenTar immediately wanted to know, his expression a mix of fear and suspicion, and ZaiWin turned to him with a smug smile on his face.
"Like Rain said, I'll take you there, later on. So be patient, will you?"
ZenTar opened his mouth to contest but no words came out. What the …? And what was that?, with that relaxed posture, and that idiotic smile?! His green eyes immediately turned to the boy, standing silently at VinWei's side. He, on the other hand, looked exactly the same, his face showing nothing, his pale gaze attentively following their conversation.
VinWei chuckled and gently patted ZenTar's shoulder in mocking consolation. ZenTar wished he could strangle her!
"Rain. I hate to bother you with this. But is there anywhere ZenTar and VinWei can stay?" ZaiWin went on, turning to the older woman, and Rain's eyes landed on VinWei and on her braided blond hair once more. "They came all the way here to help me solve a very important matter," he added, seeing in the woman's eyes that she did not want to allow VinWei to stay anywhere, and Rain finally released a deep breath.
"Our houses are small. We don't have extra bedrooms," she curtly announced, even though her house obviously had one. "But if Master Zen will be okay with it, there is a small cave near the back of the village. It was too small to make into a dwelling, so we have been using it as a storage place. I could ask some of the women to get it cleared. Maybe clean it a bit and fix it so that people could temporally use it as a sleeping quarter. Nothing fancy, I warn you," she quickly added, her dark gaze going to VinWei, even though she had made a point to exclude her from the conversation.
ZenTar smiled, bowing respectfully.
"That would be perfect. We will be fine, as long as we have a roof over our heads and a blanket to keep us warm at night," he assured and Rain snorted, still looking at VinWei, clearly doubting his words.
Even though VinWei wore simple traveling clothes, and her blond hair was simply braided and tightly wrapped around her head, there was something undeniably regal about her posture, something that would always set her apart from the common people.
"I will see to it, then. I'll be back in just a moment," Rain declared and made her way to the door, purposely making VinWei step out of her way.
"Uff … I am clearly being hated," VinWei sighed the moment the older woman was out of earshot and ZaiWin sighed as well.
"At least they didn't try to kill you the moment you stepped into the village. You're lucky that Grisly and his band are mostly hangover. We weren't so lucky."
"What?!" ZenTar immediately demanded, his green eyes coming ablaze, and ZaiWin waved a dismissive hand, crossing the room to sit on a chair.
"Nothing we couldn't handle. In fact, nothing Snow couldn't handle. He froze the whole lot of them to the ground," he declared, sounding amused, and both ZenTar and VinWei turned to gape at the boy, who instinctively shrunk back.
"You … froze them?!" VinWei asked, sounding truly shocked, and the boy blinked, nodding with a confused expression on his face.
She made it sound as if he'd done something wrong. It wasn't as if he'd killed any of them, Snow thought, his pale gaze turning to ZaiWin in search of confirmation. The glint of amusement he found in his bright-blue eyes immediately reassure him.
"It was only their feet," ZaiWin explained, propping his elbow on the table and leaning his head on one hand. "He actually saved their lives. The way things were progressing I would have probably been forced to kill one of two of them, before I could put a stop to that whole idiotic nonsense," he added, his voice becoming as cold as his gaze, and ZenTar sighed, crossing the room as well, to drop heavily on the hard, stone couch.
"That idiotic man!" he grunted and ZaiWin shrugged.
"He accused me of being a traitor. Because I left Nox in someone else's hands. That kind of reaction was to be expected, I guess."
"And you still came here?!" ZenTar accused and ZaiWin took a deep breath.
"I couldn't think of anywhere else. I was … we were too exhausted to risk anywhere else. At least here I knew that once I dealt with Grisly we would be more or less safe. Which reminds me." He looked up at VinWei. "Better not mention who your father is."
"Never even crossed my mind," she quickly replied. "It is true that father's name can open a lot of doors, but it can as easily make those who evoke it a living target. I'm already being hated as it is." She sounded depressed, and then then her purplish eyes turned to Snow, a worried expression on her face.
"Were you all right?" she asked, clearly associating Rain's distaste for her presence with her blond hair and purplish eyes. As expected, Snow tilted his head to one side, unable to understand what she meant.
"The people here don't pay attention to insignificant things like one's hair color or skin tone. They only care for lineage," ZenTar explained. "If you were like them, born of the streets, you could have three eyes and four arms, they would still welcome you. But if you're of noble blood … The mere fact that his name is Snow will assure that he's more welcomed here than any of us will ever be. He'll be safer, too. They are blindly loyal to one another. You know how it is, right? Murders and thieves may terrify the good people of the Empire, may even try to deceive one another, but they will stick together like glue when it's really needed. That's what made reorganizing Nox's society so difficult."
"And it's still far from being what other Provinces would consider a conventional society," ZaiWin added, to which ZenTar nodded in agreement.
"Snow is just Snow. Like most of them, he's just a kid who grew up in the streets. They won't care if his hair is silver, black, green, or blue. Especially Grisly's band of misfits. There was a time when I actually thought he did his best to collect the strangest people he could find. And Snow even showed them that he can defend himself. I am sure they would be happy to take him in, if we were to leave him here."
Snow's eyes widened in fear at that. Not that he didn't like Rain and the people of the village. Well, all except Storm, he frowned at that. But he didn't want to be left behind! He didn't want to …
His thoughts scattered when he noticed he'd been looking at ZaiWin, mentally hoping, begging, that he would deny that possibility.
Why …? Why wouldn't he want to be left there? In that small village, everyone was nice to him, now that he had found the waterfall cavern even more so. He also liked the land, the way it gently hummed to him. He could easily see himself living a peaceful life in that place. This was the kind of life he had always dreamed of. Maybe he could care for a patch of land, near the singing waterfall. Or feed the goats, he wouldn't mind that. He could easily picture all that in his head, and a feeling of peace and tranquility immediately took over his heart … But only if that didn't mean that he'd have to be left behind. Only if that meant that … ZaiWin would stay as well, he realized, immediately averting his gaze, clenching his fists so hard that his hands hurt.
What was he doing? Getting attached to a man like that! Sure, he had been much nicer to him, ever since he'd idiotically come for him, even going as far as to stab himself to death in order to force him to comply with his will. But people did not change just like that! In fact, wasn't the method he had used to make him choose to stay with him more than enough proof of how much of an egotistical, manipulative, self-serving person he really was? ZaiWin hadn't cared for anything. Not Snow's will. Not ZenTar's or VinWei's feelings. Not what would happen to all those people, should he had really ended up dead. He had unilaterally pushed all those worries onto Snow, forcing him to give in.
First he had wanted to get rid of Snow, and so he had treated him coldly, sometimes even cruelly, threatening to kill him if he so much as looked at him the wrong way. Then he had arbitrarily changed his mind, Heavens only knew why! And so he had thrown everything else away, just to make sure things would go his way. Who was to say that he wouldn't change his mind again? No. That man was nothing like Sand, that had stayed by his side no matter what. And the cold eyes that now occasionally smiled at him were obviously capable of turning hard and cruel again, just like that.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________-Hei, silly ZaiWin. Just kissing the kid won't do the trick. Even if he does remember it, things like that will only make him even more suspicious. 😔 Hell, I would be suspicious as well. 😒 Snow is right. From his pov it's like ZaiWin has a split personality or something 😔