**The mind already knows what the body and soul deny. It watches knowingly and relishes with delight when the body comes to a consensus with it... By Loctovia**
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A/N: Bonus chapter as requested ^-^
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[It was all dark. She tried to open her eyes wide to see anything but, wait… they were already open! However, she could not make out even an outline of anything. Usually, one can make out the outlines of objects when it is greyish dark out, but for here and now … just nothing! It felt like an infolded area and was very quiet.
She could hear the faint chirps of the insects of the night outside, which probably meant that she was inside an enclosed area of a sort, but she wasn't sure of the direction from whence the sounds came. It felt more supernatural-dark and heavy as she felt swallowed by … well by nothingness. It was crazy that she was thinking of supernatural stuff now, but considering what she had seen herself in the past few days, anything was just possible. She began to feel scared, and many questions rolled over in her head.
"Where am I?" she asked herself with a slightly rising panicky voice.
"How did I get here? When did I get here? How do I get out?"
The endless questions bounded off her lips and in her mind. It echoed slightly in the room she was in even though it was just whisperings from her. She felt her heart start to pound, and her palms also felt sweaty and clammy.
She had heard that the other senses of a human become enhanced if they lose one. As she could not use her sight, she decided to test that theory, as Lendon had gotten too flustered to think about anything else. The last thing she wanted to do was lose her wits, which will be dangerous for her, considering she knew nothing of her location or even how she got there.
Lendon took in a gulp of deep air to steady her slightly shaking body and nerves. As she gained a little composure, Lendon closed her eyes and tried to listen attentively. It seemed to be working as she could now hear the cricket sounds more clearly. She also smelt a slight musty book odour in the air. She thought, "I must be in a place that holds a lot of books to have this smell."
As she sensed nothing in front of her, she reached out her hands and moved them slowly left, then right while she took slow and steady steps forward. She did this until her hands hit what seemed to be a shelf. Holding on to it, she felt her way around it and touched, books! It looked like Lendon confirmed her thoughts about the smell, but the question remained,
"What was she doing in a library? She did not have access to such a facility in the palace, and had never even entered one before. "Am I even in the palace?" she asked herself.
She scrunched up her face as she tried to listen more, … to anything that would help her to make out her surroundings but, rather, she felt the hair on her hands stand up suddenly. She was not alone! She felt the presence of another, in the same place. Lendon was almost positive that she had been alone previously, but, where did this new person come from? She didn't know if the person was a friend or foe.
"What do I do now?! Should I keep quiet or call out for help?" she asked to herself, and then … chided herself as well, "Who will answer my call but the person I am here with?"
As these new lines of thoughts went through Lendon's mind, a candle flickered in the dark almost a few meters from her, causing her to jump back in surprise. She held her mouth with both hands to muffle the scream that threatened to come out.
Looking up, she saw … Indicy!
"Indicy?" she called out and then she gasped, Lendon covered her mouth again as if scared of what she might utter next.
"Oh my! what did I just call the king?" she thought to herself.
The candle kept flickering as Indicy stared at the girl in obvious fascination. Before she could react, he took one step toward her, and she took one back. She looked left and right but could not make out much, beyond the range of the light given by the flickering candle. When he moved forward again, she tried to move back but realised that her back had hit a bookshelf and she had no way of moving.
He continued closing the gap and stopped a couple of steps from her, bending at the waist, he used one free hand to move her hands away from her where it covered her mouth and placed a fleeting kiss on her lips. The brushing of the lips was so subtle that it was over before she could react.
Lendon jumped back or at least tried to jump back in surprise but as her back was against a shelf, there was no space to do that. Her cheeks flushed red instantly as he gazed at her with his emotions on his sleeve …]
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In the middle of the night and just before the birds sang, Tarragon stepped out to use the outhouse. She was usually a scaredy-cat, so she basically run to the place. It did not help that the outhouse for maids was quite the distance from their room. Thalia was the person that had usually accompanied her on such nights. And she missed her this night as she hastened her steps, with a shawl on her shoulders to keep some of the night chillness out of her body. She bowed to the few night patrols she saw, and rushed back to their room as soon as she was done.
After closing the door gently behind her so as not to wake Lendon, she leaned her back on it and held her chest as if willing her fast-beating heart to slow down. She slid down the door and sat on the bare ground just as she heard a few birds chirping. This signalled that she could not go back to bed even if she wished, because their time to get up was near.
She only noticed Lendon's restlessness when she managed to calm herself from her 'morning run.' Slowly getting up from her position, she saw Lendon writhing on her bed for some time and then she let out a few moans.
"Is she in pain?" she questioned herself as she peered at Lendon's sleeping form. Then she started shaking her to wake her up as it looked unusual even for Lendon.
"Wake up! Lendon," she scream-whispered.
Lendon woke up abruptly to Tarragon shaking her.
"Hey, are you okay? You were tossing and turning so much," Tarragon asked again worriedly.
"Do you have a fever?" Tarragon asked as she placed the back of her hand on Lendon's forehead to check her temperature.
"Why is your face so red," Tarragon asked in succession,
She appeared to have a worried look on her face that made Lendon feel touched.
Lendon shook her head in reply and said,
"No, I'm okay, thanks for asking," she simultaneously touched her cheeks with the back of her hands and felt that they were slightly warm but not alarming.
"It was just a dream. I'll be alright" Lendon added and tried to smile but it faltered on her lips, but she thought to herself, "So now I am dreaming about the king as well?! What should I do now?"
Tarragon sat by her on the bed and asked, "When will you tell me about these dreams that you've been having since we came here,"
[A/N~ Loctovia]
"Don't you trust me enough to share or do you think that I will tell others about them? Or … maybe, you just don't want to!" she said the last part, bitterly.
Lendon looked at her and said, "Really, Tarragon, it's nothing! Sometimes, it's just embarrassing", as she said this, her cheeks turned crimson red as she blushed.
Tarragon relaxed instantly and smiled knowingly,
"Oh, my friend, don't tell me you're having 'those' kinds of dreams!" she hush-said in a teasing way, and the girls giggled while rolling around the bed.
In all this, Lendon was thinking to herself, "It's best she thinks this way, even though she is not far from wrong with this dream, because the last thing I need now is to be labelled an enchantress!"
"Because at this time, I am seriously doubting myself as I think that I am one or turning to be one".
She had learned to school her thoughts so much that, her friend did not notice anything as they rolled around on the bed in a rare fun moment after Thalia had left!
When they temporarily paused their jesting, Tarragon studied Lendon on the bed and asked, "So, what were you dreaming about? Or rather, whom were you fantasizing about?"
Lendon, "…"
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