Leia and Rosai rushed towards the sound of the violent commotion outside of the courtyard. It seemed to come from near the training grounds, and so it was there that they headed. They were just in time to find their brother, Elias, hovering over what appeared to be a heap of crumpled metal on the ground, and running an agitated hand through his unruly golden hair.

“Yes, well, it is a work in progress you know,” he was saying to the heap. “Terribly sorry about that, Leonard.”

As Leia looked closer, a rather shellshocked figure was starting to emerge out of the heap, and was resolving itself into the form of Leonard, Elias’s young page. Suddenly, the chaos started to make sense, and Leia looked suspiciously around her. A large, heavy looking ball of what appeared to be compacted linens lay nearby the metal heap, and a makeshift catapult some thirty feet beyond confirmed her suspicions. She rounded on her brother.

“Elias, you idiot, can you not test your armour inventions on something else, preferably not a human being? Look at what you’ve done to Leonard – he resembles a battered pile of rubbish as a result of you shooting a pile of rubbish at him!”

As Leonard shifted uncomfortably at the altercation, Elias looked up at Leia, a crooked grin beginning to creep across his face.

“In my defense, I only hit him with some old bedsheets.” Leonard, who as Elias’s best friend was usually a willing accomplice to all but his most outrageous tests, began to chuckle, and as Leia saw that he was largely unscathed, she began to laugh as well.

“Elias, you are an ass,” she grinned. “What is this supposed to be anyway, some kind of catapult-proof armour? Or is it specifically designed to resist housewares only, in case the matrons of Myaengaer ever start a rebellion?”

“Aw, come on Lei, everyone knows I make the best armour and weapons in all the kingdoms. This one is just in the..er..prototype stage,” he countered with a somewhat dubious glance at Leonard’s dishevelled appearance.

“If by everyone you mean the toothless members of the farmers’s militia who meet in the village inn, then yes, I’d say your windmill powered manure machines were a smashing success.”

“That was one time, and I was only trying to help Rohad since the poor devil lost his donkey!” To this Leia gave her brother an affectionate smile.

“All joking aside Elias, of course your armour work is distinctly brilliant. It’s just the test phase that frays the nerves around here. I’d say between Leonard and your training master, they know more good hiding places around here than I do.”

At this, Rosai broke in for the first time.

“Speaking of Leonard, we’d better get you inside and assess the damage. Shall we everyone?” Leia smiled at her sister’s usual calm practicality.

As they walked towards the house, all thoughts of Masters forgotten, Leia considered her brother’s armour work and his sometimes calamitous testing process. Despite her teasing, she was actually very proud of Elias’s skill as a warrior and with a forge, creating beautiful and effective battle materials. She found herself thinking about the Illyria Gift, as it was referred to by her superstitious village. The townsfolk knew about the mysterious abilities of the manor’s family, but as a deeply connected and fairly isolated duchy, they kept this protectively to themselves.

Magic ran through the family – Grand Duke Darius had a flair for influencing the feelings and decisions of those around him, while Grand Duchess Gwyneth had the uncanny ability to know what those who she focused on were thinking; a rather feared trait for those ruled by the strong, capable woman. Elias’s gift centered around the battlefield, giving him elevated strength, speed, agility, skill in fighting as well as the ability to predict moves of the opponent, and a flair for armour and weaponry design. Rosai was an unsurpassed healer, who possessed a virtually encyclopaedic knowledge of ailments, injuries, remedies and healing methods, and who could learn what she needed to with incredible speed and accuracy.

 Leia, however, did not know quite what her own gift was - only that she was simply and more strongly magical than anyone she had ever met, including her family. She possessed a bit of each of their powers, and according to the elder lorekeepers of the village, she gave off a distinct and strong aura of magic everywhere she went. She had known, especially when she was a child with a volatile temper, thunder to burst out with her anger, showers to rain down with her tears, and blossoms to open with her smile.

The bond that she possessed with her beloved Phantasii had not previously been spoken of for centuries, and mysterious accidents had sometimes happened to those who displeased or mistreated her, not that there were many who dared to do the latter to a future Grand Duchess. Anise, one of the elder lorekeepers and a favorite of Leia’s once told her that even the silvery colour of her hair implied enchantment, and was traditionally tied to the mysticism of the moon.

Leia knew that these things were connected to her family’s retreat from court after she turned three, and to the relative seclusion of the last eighteen years of her life. When she had cried as she watched the court disappear from view for the last time, her mother had told her that she was too special to be shared with the rest of the land. She later came to realize that this meant her magic was dangerous under the public scrutiny of the royal world and the lawmakers who upheld the strictures against the supernatural.

 A memory of playing with a little boy suddenly came to her – a little boy with brown curls and amber blue eyes. They had been playing Damsels and Dragons, when they had started to argue. The boy had grabbed her beloved princess doll and pulled its head off, telling her that only real princesses could play with a princess doll. She had run angrily over to him, ready to slap his face when suddenly, his toy dragon had burst into flames beside him, making him scream and rush from the room in frightened tears. Leia, strangely unafraid of the flames, had sat and watched them crackle and dance until her anger abated, and with it the fire faded away into wisps of smoke, leaving behind only silvery ashes, which had been caught by the breeze from the window and carried away like fluttering lace.

She grinned, thinking of it now. Thankfully, since nobody took the little boy’s story seriously, the only trouble she had gotten in was from her mother, who of course knew exactly what had happened, and who reminded Leia that she had to control her emotions. She remembered that the boy had avoided her furtively for a week, until one morning she found a frog in her breakfast, and they went back to playing until the next time they quarrelled.

A little laugh escaped her as the memory finished. She wondered who the little boy had been. What was his name? Suddenly, it came to her. Caleth. Caleth, her favorite and infuriating friend. But who was he, and what had his place at court been? She recalled that he had seemed important, with various people always dropping in to check on him, and a host of servants to attend him. As she pondered her questions, the Leonard-rescue-group entered the drawing room, which she was startled to find already filled with her mother and several villagers. Her mother turned to greet them.

“Ah there you are my darlings. Leonard, you are looking rather worse for wear aren’t you? Berthe did say that the old spare linens had mysteriously vanished, and now that makes perfect sense. Alara,” she directed to a waiting maid, “please prepare Leonard a bath, and Leonard, remember that even though you are Elias’s page, you don’t always have to listen to him if it involves having stale bedding shot at you my dear.” Gwyneth twinkled at him as Alara ushered him out of the room, and then continued. “So Rohad, Lianor,” she directed to the visiting villagers, “please do continue. There are strangers that have been seen riding through Amareth since this afternoon?”

“Not just strangers, milady!” piped up Ghalar, Rohad and Lianor’s young and earnest son. “Royal riders! Members of the real life Myaen Guard, with royal crests and the most amazing horses you ever saw!” At this Gwyneth turned to his parents, with surprise and a hint of worry in her eyes.

 “‘Tis true, Your Grace,” Rohad nodded, “Rumour is that tis not only members o’th’ Guard, but Prince Caleth himself leading them, and that they were heard askin’ directions t’ward the manor itself. They may be here any moment now.”

 Caleth? thought Leia .. Prince Caleth! At the very moment she was remembering him as a child, the prince of Myaengaer was supposedly riding towards her home, presumably to see her family. Although her mother thanked their visitors with a troubled gleam in her eye, and composedly, but hurriedly left to find her husband, Leia felt a tingle of anticipation run up her spine. She was ready to meet him again, should he appear after eighteen years.

Today might be interesting after all.