iv. dictated

[heloise]

Many of you expressed a need to return home for the sake of some great purpose, as if the castle's choosing is not so arbitrary.

Or perhaps it is because we all believe our purpose great.

And, a man's home is his castle.

[ Lucrezia is lying on the snow by the duck pond, hiding from the festivities today. Her white and gold dress serves almost as a disguise, though her blue coat forming a puddle nearby does not. She watches the sky and haltingly hums a song. ]

Comments

[craggyfaced]

[He really is, especially since he chooses not to discuss himself much further]

And is it for what is upon that table, or the people who surround it?

[heloise]

[ Tease! She laughs. ] It is the people who surround it that I long for.

Whose absence pain you, Sir Durge?

[craggyfaced]

[Well played.

There is a pause, while he decides how to answers]

I had many friends back on Eldh, though most of all I regret the presence of Lady Grace.

[And Lady Aryn, whom he loved, and whom he would likely never see again]

[heloise]

[ The sweetest! She sounds amused. ]

This Lady Grace, does she hold your heart?

[craggyfaced]

No, dear lady, merely my loyalty and my friendship.

[heloise]

She must be a great woman to have you hold her in such honor.

[craggyfaced]

Indeed. She is destined to be a queen.

[heloise]

Is she a princess? Or is she betrothed to a prince?

[craggyfaced]

She is princess of a kingdom long fallen, and it is with her that the hope to repel the Pale King lies.

[heloise]

An exiled princess. And you are the knight still loyal to her, Sir Durge.

[craggyfaced]

I am not even of her kingdom, but I suppose I was fated to be by her side since the day I found her nearly dead in the snow.

[heloise]

You are responsible for the lives you save, Sir Durge?

[craggyfaced]

Not all.

[But the ones he had the power to watch and protect? Yes. Besides, he'd known she was a queen the second he laid eyes on her. Knew it before she or anyone else confirmed it. Maybe his heart had told him so.]

[heloise]

Then how do you choose who is more worthy?

[craggyfaced]

That is harder to explain. All life is worthy. I suppose it helped that she chose me as much as I her.

[heloise]

How honored you must have felt.

[craggyfaced]

Very honored indeed, though I cannot account for her reasons.