107.
Forgive my quiet. It seems I have been kept busy. And we have new residents now, do we not? I would ask your forgiveness too in not contacting you sooner. I am Zelda, Lady of the city, a healer first and foremost. I can also provide housing for any who still require it. Difficult though it can be, I would do all I could to help you feel settled
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Riqis...
[Her eyebrows knit in concern, and she understand, why he didn't come to her, why he tried to keep it quiet - and she respects that. She sees also, that it taught him a valuable lesson. Time, as they say, is the greatest teacher, but it is less so time and more the experience that comes with it.
Yet she should have acted sooner, she knows, and is guilt prickles up her arms as she folded them, rose, and took a few steps forward to extend her hand to her guard.]
I understand why you did not come to me.
[Her voice remains soft, but firm. Earnest.]
But you should have, at least to tell me. I need to know.
[She guides him to sit down in the chair she just vacated, and kneels down, smiling, small and rueful.]
Whatever Terra says to you, you are just as real a guard as any of the others, as any I have had. I asked you to join because... I felt it would be beneficial to all of us. Not because I felt sorry for you.
[And as she speaks, as she holds his hand, she is looking, searching in him for the pain, where he is yet injured.]
And right now, you may not be the greatest fighter in the city, the strongest or the fastest, but you do not need to be. Terra has a great deal of experience. In time, you will learn, Riqis, provided you are willing and eager to. That is what matters.
Do you understand?
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[He begins to protest faintly, a bit of confusion when she sits him down in her chair and then takes to a knee beside him. His eyes widen a little bewildered- Nono, that's not how things go, this is backwards, that's not where the princesses are supposed to be in relation to their knights.
Riqis makes a faint anguished sound, sighing out with a soft grunt tailed to the end for where it still hurts at his side, where the bone still hurts every time he breathes in deep.]
I'm sorry....I'm sorry I kept it to myself...this is my fight, about me, I need to show him I can face things fine all on my own.
[His hand squeezes back at hers, and he looks back at her in the same earnest.]
I don't want to be No One. I'll fight better, I promise you, I can fight better...I- I only existed a few days, I think, before I came here...I know I can be just as good as Riku, someday, at least.
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[And wasn't it strange, to look up at him and know he was - had once been - just a construct, fragments of someone else pieced together and stitched whole. Wasn't it strange, that he'd come from darkness, from shadow, when the Hyrulean symbol for light was etched into the tiles of the floor?]
You will never be 'No One'. You are not just some pale shadow of another.
[Wasn't it strange, that once, she'd have first looked upon him as some sort of abomination, a monster, even? Yet here she knelt by him. Held his hand. Sought to ease his pain.]
It does not matter how you came into the world, or for how long you have been.
[It does, on some level, doesn't it? Would have. Should have. But this is End World, and it has taught her much.]
You are Riqis. A knight of my guard and a dear friend, to me and, I know, to others in the city. Let that define you, shape you, not what created you.
I know you can face things. You are stronger than you know, Riqis. And in time, your skills will improve as you hone them. But do not let your heart be troubled in the meantime.
[His ribs. Cracked? It seems the worst injury remaining, anyway.]
You do not wish to be healed?
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Thank you.
[He murmured, feeling rooted numbly in the chair with a small wanting to stay close to her, which was strange. When he'd first realized what a good person Sora was, his first instinct was to flee in shame and leave the right Riku take that place.
Of course, it hadn't been long till he'd craved to take Riku's place and fight him for that person to be once more, to be someone...but even now he recognized that as selfish.]
I...figured I would just let it fix itself, but-
[He trails off and glances to her hopefully, apprehensive...was there a lot of light involved in healing, might that hurt worse? And did he deserve that kind of thing, after losing so badly in something that was more of an honor match than a spar?]
Well I didn't think you'd heal someone who picked fights...although it really was Terra asking for it, even though I challenged him.
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