A New Friend

On the second day of Elaine's visit, they received another guest. Feanix had informed Elaine about a new friend she made who didn't live that far away from her home and wanted them to get to know each other. Feanix believed they would get along well and Elaine was open to having new friends anyways.

"Nice to meet you, Lady Elaine." The girl curtsied. Her shoulder length curly black hair were braided on the front sides and tied together at the back. Her skin was as brown as chocolate and her eyes had a lighter shade of brown. Elaine found the dimples on her cheeks very adorable. "My name is Olivia Caris Harvala."

"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Lady Olivia."

Since it was a chilly rainy day, they decided to have some tea inside. Elaine liked Olivia already. She was very polite and calm much like Feanix. But she had a cheerful and sunny demeanour unlike Feanix who expressed less emotions.

"I hope it's alright that my brother came along," Olivia said, a bit worried that he might cause some trouble.

"Oh, it's alright. My brother is always happy to have a different sparing partner." Feanix smiled at her.

"I'm relieved to hear that," Olivia replied, giving Feanix a smile back.

Elaine didn't really know what to say, so she was mostly listening to their conversation. But listening was already enough for her. She believed she had nothing interesting to share.

"By the way," Olivia changed the subject. "Did you hear about the witch that was caught in town recently?"

This caught Elaine's attention as well as Feanix. The numbers of witches was declining, but witches were still found from time to time. The fear people feel whenever they hear the word never went away.

"...No, I haven't," Feanix answered, looking a bit disturbed. "What happened?"

"Apparently she lived in town for a long time without knowing she was a witch," Olivia explained. "She went to the church to get a blessing for a healthy pregnancy. That was when the artefact activated."

"...That's terrible," Feanix said looking a bit sad. But nothing could be done about it. This wasn't a rare occurrence for a woman to find out later in life that they were witches since the church couldn't bless every single person in town. There was a fee for it after all.

Elaine felt a bit lightheaded and began to tremble. To think that a witch could be anywhere and even nearby made her face grow pale. The memories of her parent's death came back to her. She couldn't utter a word while the two other girls continued their conversation.

"I kind of feel bad for her," Olivia looked down at her teacup. "She was supposedly a devoted believer of the Goddess. But then she only found out that she's a witch, the enemy of the church."

"And she was just about to have a child," Feanix added with a bitter smile on her face. "She must have felt so terrified. I feel sorry for her."

"...deserve it," Elaine mumbled.

Feanix and Olivia turn to face Elaine. She was gripping her skirt tight between her fingers and both girls could feel the anger and fear she felt just by looking at her face. They were stunned and they looked at each other not knowing what they should do.

"They don't deserve it," Elaine said clearly this time. "Such things as pity. They don't deserve it. The w-witches have done terrible things to people, including m-me and my family. If they didn't exist in the first place, I wouldn't have to go through what I did."

Feanix couldn't help but flinch and Olivia was concerned for Elaine. Olivia wanted to apologise for upsetting her, but Elaine continued.

"If they didn't exist, my parents wouldn't have been forced to work for that b-baron. They wouldn't have had to d-die the way they did," Elaine started to cry and had to gasp for breath in between. "I absolutely detest witches."

Feanix stared at Elaine with shock in her eyes. She knew that Elaine had a past with witches, but for it to be this bad. She had no way of knowing. She clasped her hands together tightly.

"My apologies for being so insensitive, Lady Elaine." Olivia placed a hand on her shoulder to give some comfort. She handed Elaine a handkerchief to wipe away the tears. "I promise I won't be bringing up this topic again."

"...No," Elaine said between hiccups. "I'm sorry for ruining the mood like this. I had no intention to..."

"I know," Olivia said while patting her back. She started to think of ways to cheer her up. She looked outside and noticed the rain had stopped. "How about we visit the boys in the training grounds? A change of scenery might do us some good."

Elaine nodded and Feanix agreed. So they made their way to the training grounds. Olivia and Feanix took the lead and Elaine followed behind them, still feeling ashamed of her actions. Olivia noticed how dejected Feanix was so she asked her if she was alright.

"I'm fine," Feanix said averting her eyes. "Thank you for asking, Lady Olivia."

"Didn't we say that we can leave out the titles?" Olivia said as she chuckled.

"Ah, I'm sorry." Feanix looked at her a bit flustered. "It must have slipped my mind."

"That's alright," Olivia said with a smile. She then noticed a tiny spider on Feanix hair. "There's a baby spider on you hair. May I remove it?"

"A sp-p-pider?!" Feanix immediately stopped moving and her face turned pale.

"Don't worry. It's just a baby so it can't hurt you," Olivia tried to reassure her.

She was used to insects since she lived near a forest and a lake. They often showed up inside her house and she played with them as a kid so she couldn't be fazed by them any longer. But it was different for Feanix.

"Small creatures such as insects are unpredictable. You never know when, where or how they will show up," Feanix said, her face pale. She looked at Olivia with a pleading face. "Please take it off my hair."

Olivia found this quite cute. Feanix was usually calm and collected so it was rare to see her panic like this. She gently took the spider off her head and placed it on a nearby bush.

"Thank you, Olivia." Feanix sighed with relief.

"My pleasure," Olivia replied.

She noticed she accidentally pulled a few strands as she removed the spider and they were sticking out. She fixed it and tucked Feanix's hair behind her ear, Surprising Feanix herself.

"There," Olivia said with a smile on her face. "All better!"

"Thank you..." Feanix said feeling a bit bashful.

Elaine watched them from behind and thought how nice it was to have a close friend. She wished she could get friendly and comfortable around them like that someday too.

They were close to the training grounds and the sound of wooden and metallic swords clashing against each other could be heard even from a distance. The knights came into view and only when they came closer did they find Kayden and Olivia's brother.

"Hey, Jerk!" Olivia shouted to get her brother's attention.

Both Kayden and her Brother looked towards them. Her brother wiped away his sweat with his arms and waved up his arms with a big smile. Both boys talked for a bit and came walking towards them.

Her brother looked very similar to Olivia. Almost like a her boy version. He too had dimples whenever he smiled and they had the same eyes. He was slim but fit and he was taller than average. He walked over to Olivia.

"How is my lil' sister doing?" He asked as he put an arm over his sister's shoulder. "I thought you ladies were supposed to be having tea time, so what are you doing here?"

"We wanted a change of scenery," Olivia said as she brushed away her brother's arm. "And you smell unpleasant, so please don't get too close to me."

"Okay, okay," He said as he chuckled. Then he looked over to Elaine. They hadn't met personally yet so he walked towards her to introduce himself.

"You must be Lady Elaine. It's a pleasure to meet you."

"U-uhm, the pleasure is mine." Elaine wasn't told what his name was and she just heard Olivia calling him Jerk. She was a bit confused because she read it was a word for a mean person. "I'm sorry, but I didn't catch your name. Is your name really Jerk?"

This caused him to burst out laughing while holding his stomach. Elaine was flustered and Olivia told him to stop laughing. He apologised and wiped off his tears.

"It's not his name, Lady Elaine." Olivia said while blushing. "It's just what I call him all the time. I'm sorry I must have forgotten to tell you his name."

"No," Elaine said, her face getting warmer. She waved her hands in front of her. "I'm sorry for misunderstanding."

"My name is Jeril, my Lady." He said as he bowed. "My sister here just replaced the last two letters with a 'k'. It's a sibling thing."

"I-I see," she said as she touched her cheeks.

Jeril took a closer look at her. He found her appearance not that bad. She had beautiful eyes that seemed to glow in contrast to her dark hair. She would surely grow up into a beautiful lady. Moreover, she seemed to have a good personality. He smiled.

"No need to feel ashamed, my Lady."

He took out his hand and wanted to pat her head but Kayden intervened by grabbing his arm. Surprised, Jeril looked at Kayden.

"It's inappropriate to touch a lady's hair without permission," Kayden tried to sound reasonable. "Our hands are quite filthy after training too."

"Ah, ahahaha," Jeril laughed awkwardly and placed his hand on his head. "My apologies. I didn't think about that."

"I-I don't really mind," Elaine said, not wanting them to have a disagreement.

"See?" Jeril said as he shrugged, making Kayden a bit annoyed. "She said she d-"

"Hey Jerk," Olivia put her arms around his shoulders, making him bend down to her height. She pulled him away and whispered. "Please learn how to read the atmosphere and stop this instant."

Things got awkward and Kayden could tell Elaine was panicking. He knew she didn't like it when people get too close. He just tried to avoid a situation where Elaine would feel uncomfortable, but with how things turned out, he just made things awkward in a different way.

Elaine believed she caused the situation. She scolded herself for saying something she didn't mean and wanted to apologise. But before she could, Kayden got ahead of her. He looked at Elaine and lowered his gaze apologetically.

"I'm sorry," He said. "I didn't want him to get too close to you. I-I mean I know you don't like that."

"No," she shook her head vigorously. "I know you were just looking out for me. I was in the wrong."

Feanix watched them apologize to each other back and forth. She couldn't help but sigh. She had heard way too many apologies today and was slowly getting tired of it. Maeve came into her thoughts. She was someone who could always lighten up the mood. Feanix looked around the training grounds and noticed she wasn't there at all, which was very unusual. She could tell that something was amiss.