A/N: Before we start, I just thought that I should warn you that this chapter is especially long, so buckle up and prepare to be here for a while.

❂

Kimera raced up the stairs, struggling to keep up with Jasper and his long legs. She ran the words of her prophecy over and over in her head, trying to process them on her own. She had to say she was not eager to ask for Balthazar's help.

Jasper burst into the tower and she followed him in. The room was empty as far as she could see.

"Is he busy somewhere else?" Jasper wondered aloud.

Kimera was about to respond when:

"Aar!" A shape leapt from behind the door, slamming it shut, and reached long, spindly fingers towards her.

She felt her heart leap into her throat and squeezed her eyes shut, letting out a weak shout. Her hands flew to cover her face and she instinctively leapt towards Jasper and away from whoever had jumped at her.

Laughter sounding around the room caused her to drop her defenses and frown deeply at the conjuror.

"Why are you always like this?" she asked sourly.

"You're no fun," Balthazar replied, a smile still pasted on his face. "You let Raven do it all the time."

"Raven does it differently," she protested. "He's nice about it."

"And I'm not?" The smug look on his face remained as he sat in the chair by the table and propped his legs up. "I mean, I'm the nicest person I know."

Kimera crossed her arms but didn't reply.

"Balthazar," Jasper said, trying to get the man's attention.

"What can I do for you, your highness? If you don't need me to light something on fire, I'm afraid I can't help you. My water spells are getting nowhere."

"Actually, we need your help with something else completely." Jasper pulled the slip of papyrus out of his sleeve where he'd hidden it. "Kimera just delivered a prophecy, and we need you to help us decipher it."

Balthazar dropped his grin and his feet at the same time, his expression suddenly serious. "I'm guessing this one has a bit more consequence than which guard is going to get sun sickness next by the way that you came to me."

"Before we show you, you must promise not to tell the king," Kimera said.

"When have I ever told the king anything?"

"Fair enough," Jasper said, setting the prophecy down in front of the conjuror.

Balthazar scanned it once, then again, not saying a word. His eyes widened at the last few lines, his brow furrowing in thought.

"What do you think it means?" Jasper asked finally.

"'Blood of the Desert?' Obviously, the desert doesn't actually bleed. It's an oversized pile of sand." Balthazar scratched his chin. "That means it's a metaphor and doesn't refer to actual blood. The desert itself isn't alive in the way that we are, but there are living things all over it that the desert must sustain. The prophecy must refer to the lifeblood of the desert, probably a liquid, just like blood, that allows life to continue."

"But that doesn't make any sense," Kimera said. "If it were the lifeblood of the desert, surely that would just mean water. Obviously water would end the drought. I wouldn't have received the prophecy if its only purpose was to tell me that the king was corrupt and a drought means the absence of water."

Balthazar shook a finger in the air, pointing at nothing. "That much is true. Which means it's not something that supplies life... but perhaps an integral part of the desert. Something that has always been a part of it." He pulled out a blank scroll and a quill. "What liquids are there in the desert other than water?"

Kimera and Jasper looked at each other stupidly, suddenly at a loss of ideas.

"I'm pretty sure that 'desert' means 'not a whole lot of liquids around'," Jasper said.

"Well, we'd better think of some fast," Balthazar replied bitterly. "Because by the sound of it, the kingdom could depend on it."

"We need second opinions," Kimera decided. "That means we need to seek out other people we can ask about it." She ripped the blank scroll in half and began to copy down the prophecy on one piece of it, ignoring Balthazar's indignant gasp at the blatant destruction of his property. "I'll talk to Rosalind."

"You are determined to let every member of the royal family except the king know of this, is that it?" Balthazar began to mimic her, making his own copy on the remaining papyrus. "I have a friend I can ask as well."

"You? Have a friend?" Kimera faked a gasp.

"Stop it," Jasper said, tucking his copy into his sleeve again. "Let's deal with this seriously. I'll ask someone I know about it, hopefully the word won't spread. Tell only the people you trust absolutely."

"Oh well, I was going to tell Sendar everything, but now that you've said..." Balthazar said sarcastically. "Of course we won't tell anyone."

"Great." Jasper grabbed Kimera by the wrist and began to lead her out. "I guess we'll see each other again when someone gets an idea."

"See you then," Balthazar said.

❂

"And I was all 'rrrrrgh'," Raven growled, curving his fingers in front of him like claws. "It wasn't even one of my best efforts, and yet they ran like sheep. Nobles are so jumpy. They were all 'Aah, I knew the king was making a mistake letting those demons stay in the palace!'" He made his voice higher in an attempt to capture the haughtiness of the inhabitants of the king's residence.

"Why do I even talk to you?" Rosalind asked no one, smiling subtly. "You take nothing seriously."

"And yet, you sought me out." Raven smiled at her from where he sat on the stone fence. She stood across from him, leaning against an empty fountain. He didn't know what was wrong with her today, but she usually came to him when she was distraught in some way and needed cheering. She pretended to be annoyed with him, but he knew she wouldn't have come if she didn't want to see him. Kiara can take care of the tigers today, he thought. Rosie here needs a smile.

"I can leave just as quickly." Rosalind shrugged. "I'm sure Kimera would make lovely company too, and she doesn't imitate wild animal noises like a child."

"Kimera is too busy being scared by said wild animal noises." Raven's words were mocking, but he spoke with love.

The sound of footsteps from the gate to the gardens caught their attention. Kimera, being escorted by some servant or another, was walking briskly towards the two of them.

"Speak of the devil," Raven noted, hopping to his feet.

"Rosalind, I have to talk to you," she said. She turned and waved the servant away. "I'm with other people, you can go back to your job now. Thank you for getting me here." The servant nodded at her and left.

"What's up?" Raven asked.

"I have to talk to Rosalind about something." Kimera pulled a slip of papyrus from her dress. "Actually, you know what, I have to talk to you too, Raven."

"Sure, what's up?" Rosalind crossed her arms, putting on her serious face.

"So, I kinda gave another prophecy," Kimera explained, unfolding the paper. She handed it to Rosalind. "Jasper was there, so we went to Balthazar to see if he knew what it meant."

She continued explaining while Rosalind finished reading and handed the prophecy to Raven. He skimmed it and nodded like he understood everything Kimera was saying, when in fact he was very confused. Of course, he would do his best to help.

"So, that's it," Kimera finished finally. "So what do you guys think? Any liquids in the desert you can think of?"

Rosalind, of course, was filled with ideas. "The first thing that pops to mind is water, obviously, but we eliminated that already. Do you think the salt water in the Oasis might work?"

"Everything is a possibility," Kimera said.

"Snake venom," Rosalind continued. "It's liquid, and if you managed to extract enough from a snake you could do anything with it that you could with water, maybe short of drinking it."

"How much of the liquid do we need? " Raven asked. "Did the prophecy mention that?"

"No," Kimera sighed. "It was entirely unhelpful in that regard, actually."

"Great. So this is the only thing we've got." Raven ran a hand through his hair. "I guess we'd better start looking into snake venom, then."

"Hooray," Rosalind said unenthusiastically.

❂

The sun was setting, and Ecthelion still wasn't allowed to move. His feet hurt and his legs were stiff, but patrol was patrol, even if it wasn't by a well.

Unfortunately, patrols around the palace perimeter weren't any more interesting. In fact, they were almost more boring. He stood in the middle of a bunch of dead bushes, hand on the hilt of his sword, standing like a decorative statue. And he stood like that for hours.

It only provided time to think about the order from the king. He was not eager to tell Rosalind about her new training program. She wasn't an idiot, he knew that; she would piece together what her father meant by it. Her opinions of the king were wrecked enough, but now she would know that he actively wanted her dead.

A shadow of a movement caught his peripheral vision. He glanced at it, wondering if he needed to give chase. It would certainly make a good distraction from thoughts of the king. He recognized the black cloak worn by the prince when he decided it was a good idea to sneak out and mingle with the peasants. Ecthelion knew it was coming from a good place in his heart, but it was dangerous nonetheless.

He somehow managed to drag his feet off the ground they were growing permanent roots in and moved to follow him. Perhaps he was breaking the rules, but hey, if he was going to get in trouble for protecting the prince (which was, y'know, part of his job) so be it.

He knew Jasper didn't like palace life and jumped at every opportunity to get out. Ecthelion understood, he just didn't want him to go alone so often. So, as long as Jasper never knew he was there, and he could leap out to protect him whenever he needed to, what was the harm?

However, his luck today was either great or terrible. Just as he was about to hop over the palace wall to follow the young prince, another shuffle in the dead branches caught his attention.

You couldn't have chosen to sneak around before I had to follow Jasper? Ecthelion thought to himself. Whatever. I'll bust you and catch up to Jasper after.

The bushes, though dead, still made for surprisingly concealing cover. The part of the grounds he was monitoring had once been a maze of shrubbery, and Ecthelion was loath to simply push his way through the branches lest they snag in his cloak and hair. Instead, he walked confidently through the maze, having memorized it after wandering it so often on patrol.

Unfortunately for whoever he was chasing, they were unfamiliar with the patterns of the maze. Ecthelion caught up quickly.

It was not one, but two trespassers. They wore colorful silks, one in reds and purples and the other in blues and greens. He recognized the two dancers, Lylie and Emlin, from the feasts the king insisted upon holding even in the midst of a drought.

Emlin looked at him sourly, crossing her arms, but Lylie gave him a cheerful smile. "Ecthelion! Thank goodness you found us, we were just trying to leave and we got lost in this maze, we were hoping someone would fi-"

"Save it," Ecthelion said dryly, used to her lying on impulse.

Her smile dropped like a stone, replaced by a bitter frown worse than Emlin's. "Fine. Congratulations, you got us. If you're going to report us for walking around, though, you might find that it's not actually a crime to have legs."

Ecthelion held out his palm.

"I don't know what you mean," Lylie said innocently, still trying to maintain an innocent guise, but Emlin was clearly done with the whole ruse and pulled a vial of water from one of her silks, holding it delicately.

"What are you doing?" Lylie hissed through clenched teeth.

"He caught us," Emlin said, her face devoid of emotion. "And this isn't the first time, either. Might as well just give him what he wants."

Ecthelion nodded at her. "You are clearly smarter than your lying companion here."

Emlin gave him a small smile. "Clearly."

Then, to his horror, she hurled the glass vial at the ground and dashed away as it shattered.

Lylie followed her, both of them sprinting like antelope, ducking underneath a dead bush instead of trying to navigate the maze.

Ecthelion did not give chase. Instead, he knelt by the vial, gasping, praying some of the water within was still salvageable. To his amazement, though, the sandstone tiles were not even wet. In fact, the broken glass wasn't either. Upon closer inspection, he saw that the vial had been... empty.

"Damn sand dancer," he cursed under his breath. He looked up, but the two dancers were already gone. A smashed vial was hardly enough evidence to send guards after them, and even if it had been he wasn't sure it was worth it. Everyone was thirsty; some people just put their priorities first. As much as it wounded his sense of justice, he let them run. He understood that they were just trying to survive this drought.

It was too late to follow Jasper by now. The prince would have to look out for himself. So, Ecthelion simply dredged back to his post and stood still all over again, sighing to himself.

Maybe tomorrow will be more interesting.

❂

Jasper, disguised and under the name of Jay, made his way through the winding streets of the lower part of town. His bag was filled with what medicine he could safely take, most of it just supplies like cloths and gauzes. The tonics and pastes that were most effective were hard to come by, and the palace healers would most certainly notice if they went missing.

He knew this trip wasn't going to be long since the sun was already beginning to set and the palace staff would notice if he wasn't in his rooms by the time it was dark. Nonetheless, he had to get out, if only for just a little.

He ducked underneath a thin curtain after making sure no one had followed him and entered the dimly lit room. Everything was far too dry to risk a fire for light, so the little sun coming in through dusty windows had to suffice.

The large room was littered with cots, on the floor and on tables, anywhere they could fit. In hindsight, it would have been better if they'd organized them in a grid or some pattern, but they were already strewn randomly about with sick people on them so there wasn't much to do about it now.

Many of the people in the makeshift hospital had some form of sun sickness or dehydration, but were too poor to afford palace physicians. Amateur healers gathered to do what they could with the materials they got their hands on, but what had started as a center for healing had become more of a morgue.

"Jay, thank goodness," one of the healers sighed, leaving her patient to stand next to him. "Where have you been? We've lost seven people in the time you've been gone."

"Seven people?" Jasper gasped. "It's been three days!" He came to help when he could, but with his duties as prince he wasn't able to sneak out as much as he liked. He became something of a supplier for the place, bringing materials from Kimera and the other palace healers, and using whatever he knew to help further. He thanked Kimera for teaching him, then thanked whoever had taught Kimera, because they had known what they were doing.

"We need your skills," the healer said. "None of us know how to treat dehydration without water. We keep them in the shade like you said, but other than that there's not much we can do except keep them company until it's too late."

Jasper scanned the room. Many of the people were either very old or very young. The children were often in need of water, needing it in order to grow up properly and healthily. The older people needed shade and cool more, to make sure they didn't get sun sickness. A few younger healers were in the corner, working hard to fan a group of elders with cloths and dead palm leaves.

Jasper gave the nearest healer his bag for them to rifle through. "I'll be right back. I'm going to get us some water."

She nodded and took it, and Jasper exited the building again, going behind it to a small clearing that was, as far as he could see, empty.

"Hello?" he called, trusting his friend could hear him.

"Hey, you," a smug voice replied from above.

Jasper looked up to see Alkemena's face a few feet above him, leaning on her elbows over a rooftop. She still had her hood up, but her mask lay unused around her neck.

"How do you always know when I'm watching you?" she asked.

"How do you always know where I am?" he fired back.

"Despite what you may think, you're not very inconspicuous walking around in the street. What I can't figure out is where you come from and go to for days at a time." Jasper sighed. Alkemena still didn't know of his true identity, even though she'd trusted him with hers. Although he wished he could tell her, he didn't think she'd understand. "You thirsty?" She dangled a clay pot in her fingers, probably filled with stolen water.

Jasper reached for the pot, and she pulled it up just out of his reach. He gave her a 'really?' look, and she smiled at him before lowering it to his hands again. He turned around to bring it back to the hospital.

"You're not going to drink any?" Alkemena asked as he began to walk away. "Jay, you should. I mean, the royals up in their palace drink as much as they want every day. You deserve to drink too." She nodded at the pot. "I've already had a few sips. I get that you're all selfless or whatever, but you can't be selfless if you're dead of thirst."

Jasper shook his head, burying his feelings of guilt. "I'm fine. The people in the hospital need it more than I do." He took a few more steps before calling behind him, "Wait there, though, I have to talk to you about something else."

Jasper ran the water over to slapdash infirmary healers, who thanked him rather confusedly (no doubt wondering where he'd gotten it from) and came back out. Alkemena had descended from the roof and was leaning against the wall, inspecting her calloused fingers.

"So, what's so important?" she asked when she saw him, looking up to meet his eyes. "I do actually have places to be but it's clear that whatever you are thinking about is greatly distressing you."

"What do you mean by that?" Jasper asked, pulling the paper out of his sleeve. He'd thought he'd been pretty calm since leaving the palace, playing the part of just another peasant. He wasn't sweating through his boots or anything, so he didn't know what had tipped her off.

"You're just more... fidgety than usual," Alkemena confessed. "Something about your face." She looked at her feet. "So, what's up?"

"I, uh..." he unfolded the prophecy. "Well, the palace seer gave another prophecy earlier today."

"The palace seer? Isn't she kind of... you know, I don't mean to be offensive to her, but she hasn't delivered a real prophecy in, like, forever. What makes this one so special that you need to talk to me about it in a back alley?" She paused. "How'd you even get your hands on it, anyway?"

"I... I'm friends with a servant in the castle. His name's Aslan, and he's good friends with the seer." It wasn't a total lie, Jasper considered Aslan a close friend and confident, and he was sure Kimera was the same. Of course, Aslan hadn't heard the prophecy, but if Jasper knew anything about Balthazar, the servant would know it by the end of the day. Jasper still felt bad lying to Alkemena, though.

"And I'm guessing that this time it was actually something of consequence?" Alkemena took the slip of paper from him and skimmed it. "Why are you coming to me about it?"

"The prophecy mentions a way that we might be able to end the drought, but it also drones on and on about how corrupt my- uh, the king is." Jasper caught himself right before he referred to the king as his father. "The people who know about it are doing their best to hide it from him, because if he was to find out, bad things would assuredly happen. We're looking for second opinions about this last line here," he pointed to the last line on the paper, "because we have no idea what it's referring to. We've cleverly deduced that it does not mean water, so what do you think?"

Alkemena gave him a sort of nervous half-smile but didn't say anything. Her eyes stayed glued to the paper. He wondered why they didn't move, if they were fixed on one word instead of reading the whole thing.

Oh. Wait. He mentally slapped his own forehead. Alkemena had never been professionally taught to read, which meant that even printed words in books would be hard to understand, much less the chicken scratch that was his handwriting. She probably thought he was asking her to read a different language.

"Gosh, I'm so sorry." He took the paper back from her. "Do you want me to read it to you?"

She nodded sheepishly and he read it aloud.

"Well, it's good to know that we're not the only ones who think that the royal family is corrupt." Jasper nodded but didn't say anything. Alkemena was clearly of the opinion that when the king was mentioned, his entire family was mentioned in the fine print. "But other than that... I don't know, I don't go out in the actual desert that much. Why are you even asking me?"

"Because I value your opinion," Jasper told her.

Alkemena looked away again. "Well, I don't have any ideas right now. I guess I could sleep on it? If you come back soon I might have some ideas."

Jasper nodded at her. "I'll be back as soon as I can, in that case."

She smiled at him. "Does that mean you have to go now?"

Jasper sighed. "I'm sorry. There's just... stuff. I have to go."

Alkemena nodded. "I get it. I just hope one day you'll trust me enough to tell me." She clapped him on the back. "Until then, I'll do my best to think about this prophecy. See you later."

"See you." With that, they parted. Alkemena somehow managed to scale a wall with zero footholds, and Jasper walked back onto the main road, which, despite its name, was empty.

He really wished he could tell Alkemena everything. It was a weight on his chest every time he saw her... hell, even when he was alone. But for now, that was how it had to be.

❂

Aslan let a breath slide through his teeth in a sort of sigh. "It had to be vague and cryptic, didn't it?"

"It wouldn't be a real prophecy if it weren't," Balthazar affirmed. "Of course, it would have made everyone's life easier, but we can't have that, now can we?"

The servant put a hand to his parched, tattooed throat, as he seemed to do so often now. He hoped Balthazar hadn't noticed his new habit. "Have you thought of anything?"

Balthazar turned to the list he'd written. It barely qualified as a list with only two items, but it was enough. "We have snake venom and cactus juice. Other than that, we don't seem to have too many ideas." Balthazar sighed and put a hand on his forehead with his elbow on the table and his thumb on his temple. "I guess we better start getting them soon, though."

"Please don't stay up all night thinking about this," Aslan warned. "Your sleep schedule is bad enough as it is without all this-" he threw his hands up and gestured at the papers in front of them, "Prophecy stuff."

"Why do you know my sleep schedule?" Balthazar asked, a glint in his eye.

"I can see the tower torches that are still lit in the middle of the night," Aslan replied quickly. Too quickly. Damn it.

Balthazar smiled at him. "Well, in any case, I don't think there's anything to stay up thinking about. With the little stuff we've got, we may as well just start exploring these in the morning and figure out more options as we go."

Aslan nodded, content to leave it at that for the night. At least, he had been.

Jasper threw the door to the tower open with a crazed look in his eye. "What do we do with the metaphorical blood once we find it?!" he asked loudly, out of breath from running up the stairs.

Aslan and Balthazar looked at Jasper, then at each other. Guess there is something to stay up at night thinking about.

Word Count: 4308

Character Appearances:

Kimera Relicem by @ me

Jasper Vastatio by EstelElfstone

Balthazar Evander by Cynarr

Raven Blackthorn by ghostofwolves

Rosalind Vastatio by sofififlowers

Ecthelion Finweson by WingedWarrior1731

Alkemena Irving by TheShortBosmer

Aslan by dr0wning_in_w0rds

Also Featuring Appearances From:

Kiara Altaica by TheExplosiveCyborg (mentioned)

Emlin "The Cat" by dobblewolf

A/N: And that makes chapter four! As school is rapidly approaching I can't make any promises as to update schedules, but I am hoping that they will be as [in]consistent as they are now. However, if it's three months before the next update (hopefully not) you'll know why. Let me know your thoughts on how the story is going so far and if there's anything you'd like to see in the future! (Seriously, give me ideas of things that could go wrong. My inspiration is running a lil low, ngl. Side characters make suggestions of what you want to see too!) As for this chapter's question, what kind of liquids in the desert can you think of? If you're as clueless as all these characters (except for Rosalind and Balthazar), just tell me about a show you're watching right now. You know what, tell me about that anyway, on top of a liquid. In my case, I just started USA Network's Graceland :)

You really thought it was over, didn't you? Well, too bad! I have a special announcement! Today is the birthday of my very good friend Cyra, TheExplosiveCyborg! Everyone wish her happy birthday!!!!!

Cyra, your birthday present this year is a short one-shot about what Kiara is doing while everyone else is busy fretting about prophecies and corrupt kings. Enjoy!

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐓𝐢𝐠𝐞𝐫'𝐬 𝐂𝐡𝐨𝐢𝐜𝐞

𝐊𝐢𝐚𝐫𝐚 𝐀𝐥𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐜𝐚

❝I am not afraid. Not of your sword, and certainly not of you.❞

"Rosalind wants to talk to me right now, and I want to talk to her too, so I am begging you. I know that it's my day to do the chores, but could you take the day for me just this once? Pleeeeease? I'll owe you forever." Raven made his best impression of puppy dog eyes at her and gave a dog-like whine.

Kiara sighed. "Go hang out with your crush or whatever. But you will owe me forever, make no mistake about that." She waved a dismissive hand at him, and his smile grew exponentially. He dashed out of the dark tunnels cheerfully, and Kiara let him go. Even if it meant she had to spend all day in the dreary dark, at least he would have a good day with a certain princess.

She spent the next few minutes or so traipsing the tunnels and making sure there were no rats or cockroaches roaming around freely. Even if they were food for the tigers (whose food supply was being cut by the day), they could carry diseases or plagues. In this time especially, a kingdom-wide plague would not be particularly beneficial.

After finding no rats, and crushing two cockroaches under the heel of her boot, Kiara started to oil the iron doors to the arena that the tigers could be placed inside of. Couldn't have them squeaking and letting the criminal know which door held a tiger.

One task left for the day. The worst, in her opinion.

Cleaning the blood off of the tiger's maw. After yesterday's arena trial, Tero's face was bloodied with the gore of the day's massacre. Cleaning it that day, when Tero was still in the mood for murder, was very unwise. The scars on Sethos' wrists were reminders from when they didn't know this. Thankfully, during his time as the lone tiger keeper, Sethos had learned a few things.

Tero and Caspian were held next to each other in separate cages. They resembled prison cells, three out of four walls consisted only of iron bars. The door was small and slid up. The tigers inside had iron collars clamped to their necks, and at the moment had canvas sheets tied over their paws to conceal their claws. They both looked absolutely miserable. Caspian, especially. He marched in the largest circle he could manage in the miniscule space, huffing aggressively.

"Hey buddy," Kiara said quietly to Tero, who was licking his muzzle, probably trying to clean off the crusty, dried blood. "Come here."

She slid the door open and he poked his head through the opening, used to this by now. Without water to clean the tigers with, she was forced to use a comb to scrape off most of the blood. It fell like ashes to the ground, brown and flaky. The rest she picked off with her hands. Tero chuffed quietly and bared his teeth at her, but she put a hand on his head and stroked him. "Shhh, it's okay. I know you didn't spare my life just to kill me now."

It was true. When she'd been caught stealing and thrown in the arena for it, the tiger had refused to kill her. To this day she didn't know whether it was Tero or Caspian who had spared her (at the time, they hadn't had names. She'd introduced them to those), so she just treated them both as if they had been the one. Thankfully, they seemed to accept her, and she hadn't lost any limbs yet.

A sniff from behind her made her turn around. A tall, dark form standing a ways down the hallway startled her at first, but then she was just suspicious. "He told me I might find you down here."

"Who told you what?" Kiara asked, turning back to her work. She was used to Arcanus Regis visiting her when he was bored, which was often. In fact, any emotion Arc felt at any time could usually be shrouded by a perpetual layer of boredom.
"Sethos," Arc said lazily, traipsing towards her. "What are you doing?"

"Finishing up," she said. "I've got a few more blood crumbs left before I'm done for the day."

"Blood crumbs?" Arc huffed a laugh. "I thought it wasn't even your chore day."

Kiara ignored the fact that he knew her schedule by now. "I'm doing a favor for a friend."

"You? A favor? What happened to the intimidating, heartless woman I know? What did you do to her?"

"Haha. He's off on a date or something. Don't worry, though. Now that he owes me forever I plan to never clean up tiger waste again; it's his problem now."

When Tero's face was clear once again, he gave her a grateful chuff and nuzzled into her palm. She stroked him one more time before pushing on his forehead and forcing him gently back into the cage.

Arc offered her a hand and pulled her up from her crouching position. "But you're free for the rest of the day, right?"

"Why, did you have plans?"

He half-smiled at her. "I might."

He led her out of the dank tunnels and back into the sun. She had to squint at the sudden change in lighting, but the heat was no worse than it had been in the unventilated channels.

"Unfortunately, not much is interesting nowadays," Arc said. "I'd take you out for a meal, but food is starting to become harder and harder to come by."

The two of them went on outings often, in lack of anything else to do. Kiara knew that Arc spent most of his time either sleeping or combat training, and on days when it wasn't her turn to do tiger maintenance Kiara didn't have any other jobs. The two of them had already climbed the highest tower in the palace in the dead of night (without a light between them, so really it had been more like blind stumbling), gotten lost in the maze of dead bushes and spent hours finding a way out, and taken shots of cactus wine together while trying not to get drunk. Pretty soon, they were going to have to start repeating activities.

"So, today, I was thinking we should try something a little different. We always do sort of tame stuff together you know? Involving a lot of walking and sitting down."

"I distinctly remember an occasion where you decided it was a good idea to see if you could catch a live pigeon with your bare hands," Kiara pointed out, "But go on."

"It occurred to me today." Arc hovered an arm over her shoulders, not touching her but steering her to a circle of sand in one of the many courtyards. "You wear very practical, warrior-esque clothing. Yet, I've never seen you fight before."

Kiara tugged at the hem of her crop-top tunic unconsciously. Usually, she never paid any attention to what she was wearing, but when she was around Arc she always seemed to notice just how revealing her outfit was.

"So you..." Kiara looked around the sandy circle, and noticed a weapons rack by the edge of it. "You want to fight each other?"

"Well, you've seen me fight before." She had indeed. Sometimes, she'd stop by the training circles to watch the soldiers and noble gentlemen learn to fight, and yes, sometimes Arc had been one of the noble gentlemen. He was a very skilled fighter and when the sword was in his hand, the world seemed to fall away for him. "But you've never given me the opportunity to see you."

Kiara stalked over to the weapons rack and ran her hands over the metal spears. Everything in the rack was blunted to make it safe to train with. "What a pleasant way to spend the evening."

Arc grabbed a sword and Kiara grabbed a spear. They each took a shield as well, and placed themselves on opposite sides of the ring.

"I'm not going to go easy on you," Kiara warned him.

"I don't expect you to," he replied.

They circled around each other for a few moments before Arc got confident and charged her. She parried his first blow to the left with her shield and thrust the butt of her spear towards his ribs.

He leapt away fleetly, his sandals spraying sand over her shins. She felt the sting of each individual grain on her bare skin. She mirrored his movements, determined to keep him in her line of sight.

"You are good at this," he breathed.

"You asked for it," she replied.

He threw the flat end of his blade towards the back of her knee, probably to knock her to a kneeling position. She jumped over the sweep of his blade and jabbed down with her spear. He narrowly dodged the blow and it glanced off his shield.

The two danced back and forth for a time, neither of them gaining the upper hand. Arc was more aggressive than Kiara, attacking while she defended. He kept trying to catch her off guard and surprise her, feinting to the left, then the right, aiming to sweep her off her feet. But he could never get close enough. She blocked every blow, whether with her shield, spear, or forearms.

Finally, when Kiara saw that he was beginning to get tired, he made a desperate attempt to knock her over. Instead of diving to the side to use his weapon to knock her over, he tried to hit her straight-on with his shoulder. Unfortunately for him, she saw it coming. He couldn't surprise her.

She ducked forward and rolled, sweeping her own legs underneath his while balancing on her hand. He went crashing to the ground like a dam breaking, his momentum carrying him across the sand like he was being swept down a river. Kiara assumed a standing position quickly and rushed to catch up to him before he could regain his balance.

When he finally stopped sliding, she put a sandaled foot to his chest and pointed her sword at his throat. "You can't surprise me," she said smugly.

She expected some kind of retaliation, as though he might take the opportunity to whack her skin and send her spiraling into the sand with him, but all he did was smile up at her and laugh breathily, as though he couldn't believe she had actually won. "Alright, alright. You win."

She grasped his hand and pulled him to his feet.

Then, he surprised her.

He put one hand on her hip, one hand cupped her face, and for the first time, Arcanus gently pressed his lips to hers.

Word Count: 1765

Character Appearances:

Kiara Altaica by TheExplosiveCyborg

Arcanus Regis by WaferWhale (it won't let me tag so just have words for now)

A/N: Hopefully you enjoyed it! Happy birthday Cyra!!!