“That’s a nasty cut,” she said calmly, as if she were casually examining a child’s scraped knee. “Kre, I’ll need your help,” she said without turning to face the young man. He immediately stepped forward and, without opening her eyes, she took his hand in hers and guided his hand up to Kitalia’s head.
She released his hand, allowing him to continue to brush Kitalia’s hair back slowly, carefully from her face, revealing an unbloodied forehead as he did so.
“There you go,” she said with a small smile. Kre took a moment to marvel at the seemingly miraculous healing before a sharp pain in his own head nearly dropped him to his knees.
“An unfortunately side effect,” the lady explained. “Necessary though, as the blood would have drawn much unwanted attention from the things that live down here now. There are some things down here that I cannot keep at bay in my current state, so it is best that you simply avoid rousing them if you can.”
“Thank you,” Kitalia mumbled, still unsure of what was happening, but seemingly willing to accept it for now.
“Yes,” Kre piped up, “thank you my lady. We couldn’t have made it here without your help.”
“What help?” Kitalia looked back and forth from Kre to the woman with a slightly puzzled look. “What exactly happened back there?”
Kre shrugged, “She led me here… led us here, I should say. The glimpses in the woods above, the hiding place she picked out, the door she unlocked, the color trail that told me where to run… She did all of that.”
Kitalia eyed the woman suspiciously, “What did you say your name was?”
“I never did,” the lady replied with a hint of a smile at the edge of her lips. “I find lately that I much prefer how our young Kre speaks of me,” she turned her smile to Kre, who returned it with a goofy grin of his own.
The only one of the three who was not smiling, Kitalia was not one to be so easily deterred by a flippant remark. She shrugged politely and nodded, “I thought as much. You remind me a bit of Red, that is the only reason I ask.”
The blue-eyed lady’s face darkened for a brief moment, the mirth in her playful smile gone for the matter of an instant before returning in full beaming force. “My dear, you must have hit your head harder than I thought. Perhaps some rest would do you good. Perhaps some rest would do you both good.”
“You play this game as well as Red does,” Kitalia said accusingly. “Now I know you are related.”
The lady sighed, “We are not related… except in the sense that all creatures, great and small are related in some greater purpose.”
“You are still avoiding a direct answer,” Kitalia said with a growl.
Kre chuckled, happy for once that it wasn’t him being on the receiving end of a frustrating exchange of words. “Kitalia does raise a good point though,” he said with a shrug. “I mean, I can’t keep calling you the blue-eyed lady… people already think I’m crazy for mentioning you like that. I believe they might have declared me insane if not for Braun’s desire to see me in shackles.”
The lady nodded, the sad look returning to her face. “You must understand…” she began, her voice trailing off as if lost in a distant memory. “I have gone by a great many names,” she turned and looked at each of them in turn. “My most recent name, the name that my dear Terync called me by, was Lady Sapphire.”