Chapter 10: Chapter 9: Daima

It was now taking shape. Each stroke of her graphite against the parchment, although it screams the lack of color under Celestial Torion’s light, the grays were still melding her brother’s calmness. He lay there peacefully by the bed, the afternoon birds chirping by the dormer as the glare of the elemental danced small rainbows at the spring air. Alve was a beginner at best but she always appreciated practicing the homegrown greenery in the prince’s room. She froze at a brush of another fern near Arlou’s bed when a singular leaf planted itself upon her forehead.

“Savana, how could you?” Alve grimaced at the sight of the leaf as it now fell down to her held paper. It was torn half from a plant Alve could never know and its smell was permeating a foul odor. “Big brother will hate you if he finds out you did it again.”

“Relax,” Savana replied as the older minor swept the leaf again and was making her way sleekly to the prince’s bed. Straight gold hair gleamed beautifully at the window’s light as well when Savana glided an inch to Arlou’s face. She whispered in his ear, “this is what you get when you act sleep in the presence of your future queen.” She was now pitting the foul leaf at Arlou’s nostrils, hoping it would break his rest at an earlier state.

Several moments later, he still did not yield.

“Oh. Perhaps he is asleep.” Savana threw the leaf away and was now smoothing her cousin’s same golden hair. Admitting Alve was bothered at the additional person to draw, she ignored the lady however as her cousin stroked her brother’s face. “Handsome, is he not?”

Alve could only nod as she rubbed dark ash in a rush.

“But never as handsome as the boy I met at the banquet,” Savana added.

Alve paused as memories of the dinner party crept into her mind. The explosive sound, her worried Urda, the boy.

“He wore such very dark clothes and worn a band for his long hair. He also had paler skin than yours Alve and his eyes… like his soul, were dark.” Dreamily, Savana continued comparing. “I wish I could marry him, not this unconscious brother of yours.”

“I saw him too,” Alve replied. Her drawn sketch was now forgotten when she could barely remember what the boy had meant to say to her. She stared at her art as the memory echoed harshly his buried ire.

Of bad storms and weather

Pfft. Savana giggled. “You must have been dreaming. You weren’t even there.”

“But aunt invited me, and the boy was really hurt. He had-”

Knock, knock, came the door.

“And he had a dragon where he rode it to the celestials and back to Entherah. That lousy maid had really loved reading you abandoned kingdoms.” Savana chided. The mischievous young lady had a knack for trifling her cousin’s frivolous behavior, despite being a child herself. And when Alve could only stare at Savana wistfully with her shrouded green eyes and the missing usual rebuke, this made Savana brows furrow uneasily.

“When did Thravadin take your ears?” Savon said as he strode into the room. His arrival apparently gathered all the girls’ attentions, as he always did. Alve, realizing it was him began to fluster causing her to drop her sketch papers and tipped her small table to the floor. Alve's customary behavior when her brother is around compelled Savana to jeer.

“Oh, little mouse. You should be careful.” Savon said as he went to help Alve who was now on her knees gathering her fallen items. When he brushed her hand, the little pale girl went red, “puh. Mmm. uh...” Alve muttered sheepishly.

She was nefarious like her mother but fervent like her father. Savana laughed so heavily that she began to hurt her stomach. This was beginning to annoy Savon when he and Alve finally stood up. Her brother then turned to Alve asking, “why did non of you answer the door? My mother is looking for us for a cup of tea.”

Alve could not respond as the loud beating of her heart was making each breath hurt and her hands sweaty. She merely held her papers tightly without a response. Savana was still laughing when she said, “please don’t bother her brother. Hahaha. If mother wants tea, then tea it is.” Savana was now gathering her herself then bowed at the sleeping Arlou in delight. “And the delicious tea you shall miss my beautiful prince,” she said before she left.

Exasperated, Savon then asked the princess again, “will you join us?”

Alve differed.

“I see. Please then take care of Arlou for us little mouse. In the meantime, I will have to tell mother of the courtesy Savana made. See you later.” Without batting an eye to her cousins’ leave, they left her there, now alone in the silence with her brother.

 

---

 

“Are they gone?” Arlou asked when the shut of the door caved into the pregnant silence. He was at that moment opening his eyes when his sister had outwardly jumped on his bed in a big embrace. Arlou groaned in pain.

“You’re awake!” Alve broke down.

“Ugh.. yes. I’m awake.” Realizing the pain her brother was in, Alve immediately dashed away in a farther distance.

“I’m sorry. I did not know,” she crooned sadly.

“It's fine.” Arlou was now trying to pick himself up so that he can sit by the pillows when the pain in his side stomach was making him blanch. Expectantly, he turned to his sister for assistance but she was still leaning at the wall for space. “I might need some help.”

Alve was shaking her head for a no. Arlou was now beginning to question what treatment he was having mutely when his sister implied. “We were told that you had a sickness that required no touching.”

“Now, who told you that?”

“Papa did.”

It was Arlou’s time to pause. Flashes of a dark figure with studded dark horns and the king by his side with tired eyes embraced his recollection. The prince did not actually know what had happened after being knocked out to sleep but his face was saddened at the other nightmare from the last minute.

“It's now gone silly,” he said finally to her terrified and concerned face.

“Really?”

Arlou nodded before saying, “now help me with this.”

Moments later, comfortably situated and seated, Arlou basked at the soft light from Torion and the fresh spring air of his own little garden. He then turned to her now quiet little sister, sketching him again with the dark globs of unidentifiable figures. “Is that me?” he pointed at it as he asked her.

Alve nodded in mirth.

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“Is that my arm then?”

“No, that’s your tummy,” she replied irately.

“But I’m too skinny.”

“You are skinny!”

The two siblings enjoyed their hours together in their afternoon joyfully. There were also small frequencies of Arlou being fed yesterday’s bread and water as his sister’s pile of sketches became taller and taller. It came to Arlou’s apprehension however that their Urda was missing, leaving Alve alone to serve him the ample meal.

“Where is Urda Alve? I thought she should be here by now to pick you up.” It was also at that point that Torion was sinking down at the west of the Tron mountains.

It took time for his sister to reply. He was waiting for her explanation when huge condensed tears were now running down her face. Arlou had expected for Alve to bawl when it only came to rare small hicks. “Aunt said if I want to grow up, they should replace Urda. And they did.”

Still straining her childish keening, Arlou eventually opened his arms to embrace his sister. She continued to cry when she suddenly listed the new things that had happened when he was still unconscious. Alve then told the prince of her new classroom and room, the heterogenous maids and servants, without any of their Urda in it, of Arlou being sick for two weeks, and of a new beautiful woman whom they said was her new mother.

“You have not met her yet then?" Arlou asked of the last bit she told him.

“No,” Alve sniffed before continuing, “Aunt said that I should not concern myself with the paramour. What’s a paramour, brother?”

Arlou could only blush. “Oh, well… someone not important I guess...”

Finished, the two of them lay calmly as they watched Torion emit the last of his orange light upon the night sky. Regarding the wonderful balcony view reminded Arlou of something that could help his troubled little sister.

“Alve, can you promise me something?”

Interested, Alve agreed to her brother.

The prince pointed at the open balcony. “I think your tiny hands can fit there. You see, I have this secret flower that might help you...” Alve bolted. She ran to the balcony and strained to find a flower between the jungle of potted leaves. The princess feared any of the plants as she was warned that some might hurt with just the tiniest brush against her skin.

“Where is it?” she echoed from afar.

“The one on your left. If you can stick a hand beyond the baluster, you might reach a hidden pot. Don’t worry, no plants I have brought home are sensitive to you.”

Alve sighed in relief but then suddenly jittery as Arlou added, “except for that.”

Just hanging beyond the balusters was a canopy, inlaid charon that had enough paved space to fit a small potted plant, and it was this small plant that Alve was able to find. Shaking in dread as she blindly pulled the plant over to her, all of that fear however was washed away as she came face to face with the most dazzling thing Entherah could have ever shown her.

A small thing like its weilder's, it had transparent petals as the last light of Torion shone across its mirrored veins. Veins that glowed golden in the shine. Its supposed stem were brittle small branches that gave Alve anxiety as she held it aloft. Leaves that are transparent as well, with only a single flower to remember it by, the princess was about to ask her brother about the majestic thing when he interjected, “that is what you call a daima flower.”

Alve’s green eyes glowed brightly as the mention of the part of her name gave its origin. She turned and returned to her brother’s side expectantly.

Smiling, Arlou continued, “Mother had once told me of a rare flower that grows mysteriously beyond both the humans and the fae folk’s knowledge. She said it always grows near strong sources of eth, which also glows in the dark because of it, apparently.”

“But how did you find it?”

“It was something uncle Alvon gave to me years ago. He said it would make me strong in times of worry and pain. Surprisingly, he also said it gives off eth and has strong healing potency. But I think he just said that to cover up his skills in eth-leahn. He is very good at healing you know and-”

“But how did it become a name to me?” Alve inclined.

“A name? Alvedaima? I don’t know…” Alve slumped. “Mother only told me it was rare and uncle told me about its healing properties.”

Alve’s grassy eyes shrunk and her face grimaced. She had believed she was named after a beautiful flower, one that bloomed amidst sunlight and shines in the darkness.”

As an older brother, it pained him to see the sudden turn of his little sister’s heart. He had once promised his mother to protect her, and he will always do. “Does it matter?” he asked her abruptly.

Alve sighed and shook her head. “It does not.”

“Look at the bright side, Alve. If you don’t have the origin of your name, does that mean you are its origin? Likewise, I’m giving this to you so that if you will get sad, it will help you. And if you get hurt, just be near it and it will slowly ease the pain away.”

“But how will I carry it?” The princess begged, she wondered how she would bring the mysterious thing back to her room.

“Just put it inside your bag.” This made Alve’s brows shoot up.

Softly laughing at the interlude, Arlou continued, “don’t fear little mouse for it is stronger than you think. It's very resilient to almost anything, which reminds me.” Arlou took the pot in his hand as he checked the underside of its base. It had cracks in it and even has a single rough-looking root protruding. “And you should remember to feed it.”

This time Alve was now in shock. She was baffled by the piece, but feeding it? She knew plants needed watering, but no such thing as feeding.

“It's carnivorous.” Arlou laughed again softly. “Meaning it eats anything meaty. You can feed it mosquitos or flies if you’re fast enough. And don’t worry, they don’t die. They just grow too strongly, often destroying their surroundings. Just put the dead insect on its soil, it would do its thing.”

Alve was recoiling to receive the plant again with her hands. She looked at it again under the elemental setting. But it was a flower. A beautiful flower. One that survives throughout the hardships, and was always ready to help those in need.

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