Denied at First

False Acceptance [Aerice]

As I'm finishing up thanking some of the people at the village for letting us stay, I could've sworn.. she scoffed to herself in amusement when she saw me. I hurried and wrapped things up and finally reached her.

I paused for a moment not knowing what to say, I just stared at Marin awkwardly as I'm reminded of last night. God this is getting me all worked up for no reason, I don't know why I would do those things knowing even how she feels about it.

I'm starting to open my mouth to say something.

"Hey.. uhh.. how are you doing? You up to anything?"

"No, I'm not up to anything. Moving day is today, we're finally going to the peaks of these mountains over here and over then another battle awaits us.."

She answered no too quickly, we both knew it was a lie but I still thought about other possibilities.

Obviously she's going to be up to something, every soldier is, for the moving day. But she still answered no. Maybe in personal terms, no she wouldn't be up to anything, unless moving which everyone would know. And suddenly I'm reminded of her puppets'master powers. I haven't seen the full potential because she holds herself back most times.

She can summon puppets from thin air and it can be as huge as she desires. But like I said I never saw the full potential so I can't really tell how big it can get. When she spawns one in, sometimes a small laser beam can be seen, it's a beautiful color in my eyes. I always liked colors that seemed to be fading or dying out slowly, so that's why it's so pretty for me. Sometimes when the puppet is bigger, a small star can be seen. It's more beautiful than the stars we see every night even... even? Even if what. I don't know when I became so subconscious of her and every little detail of her.

Then I finally began to speak again.

"Your puppet's master power is cool, Marin."

She seems to look a little happy about the small compliment but then there's doubt in her eyes. Doubts about her powers. I can't tell what she thinks or what anyone thinks, so I can't just go assuming anything.

When Marin begins to make eye contact with me again she says something that makes me freeze.

"Hey, Aerice. Let's forget about last night please. It was just... The heat of the moment.. you know?"

I can hear my own heart beating over the chatter of soldiers and villagers as one of them shouts we're ready to start preparing to move. A gut wrenching feel begins to twist inside me when the words Marin had said starts to set in more and more into the bottomless pit of my soul.

Then a commander comes up to us, assigning Marin to a special unit because of her puppet powers then sends me to a different unit for defense.

"What are you guys doing? We're preparing to move. Marin you're assigned to the specialized support unit, we're in need of your puppets support. And you, Aerice. You're up to join the defense this time. Aerice will most likely be behind the Attackers, supporting the two units."

Marin begins to start moving away first, walking away first. She doesn't even look at me. But I'm watching her walk away, with the commander looking at me then I go too, to my unit and to help load the carriers. The storage unit is in charge of supplies, organization, and necessities. There's horses to help move the wagon like carriages, except it doesn't have a nice roof over. Just a tarp nailed down into the wood.

"Hey... Hey! Snap out of it we're done with your help, go to the front of the defense units, okay? We're starting to move quickly."

"Move it everyone, you all should've been ready a long time ago!"

When we begin to move I steal a glance back to see how the units are positioned this time. Defense first, then attackers, supports and healers, then lastly... Recon with the storage unit behind them and some defense behind them as well. Then we're finally heading for the mountains at a steady pace. I try to take my mind off things by reminding myself we're at war, by taking in the nice smell of the forest that reeks of ladybugs at some parts, but it's still enjoyable.

It's been a few hours of walking, some jogging even, and yet, no sign of life. But there's still the occasional where some birds would sing. Although, it was still too unusual. Even I'm able to distract myself for a bit.. how was it just a "heat of the moment"? I mean Marin, she enjoyed it, she dived deeper into my touch, like she's been waiting for a sweet release just to conceal the truth behind those little fears of hers.

She accepted it at first, then I don't know what happened the early dawn and morning.