An Unfortunate Circumstance

--LEONA--

And here I thought I was clever.

I came out right as the sign-ups opened and it seems like half the Kingdom did the same thing. The noise drowned out everything. Yelling, normal chatter, the stall vendors bargaining. Excellent choice of place for a chaotic sign-up if that was their plan.

The group of men in front of me, tall, completely jacked, and arguing so loudly over something exceptionally stupid. Who had the most muscle.

They flexed, spun, and growled at each other. At first they were friendly to each other, but their volume now would suggest otherwise.

They wiggled so much that it was impossible to see around them without stepping so far out of line. So I did the next best thing. Stare through the small gaps between them as they moved. Tedious and tiring, but better than having to re-line up again.

After a few minutes they finally moved wide enough for me to see that the line had moved quite a bit and they left a sizeable gap between both parties.

Eyeing the men again, I thank my much smaller stature and move out of line. The people behind me don't seem to notice my exit which is even better.

I pull my hood a tad lower and make my way around the group and through the throngs of shoppers. I weave back into the gap and join up behind the next group of people. At least they were moving forward.

I glance back and see that the group of men are still standing a decent way back. I clear my throat. Then face palm because, how stupid am I to think they can hear me over their own chaos.

I summon my bow and stake it into the ground like a flag. Then I walk back over to the group of men and tap the seemingly calmest of the 6.

His head swings around and looks confused for a moment before I wave and he looks down.

"Oh, child. What do you want?"

I smile up at him. "Sorry sir," I say lightly, "It's just that, the line's moving and I wanted to let you know!"

He looks forward and grunts in acknowledgement before turning to his group and yelling to get their attention.

My job finished, I walk back to my bow and pluck it from the ground. Desummoning it I look back at the, thankfully, dwindling line in front of me.

Soon enough I'm at the counter and the scowling man behind it doesn't look happy.

"ID."

I pull Avé and Alek's ID's out and place them on the counter. He taps his screen and inputs the information he needs before he shoves them back. I tuck the cards away and open my mouth to thank him, but he cuts me off.

"ID."

I blink at him.

"Oh no sir, I don't think you underst-"

"ID."

"I'm not-"

"I" he enunciates, "D."

"Please sir-"

"You'd best be handing me your ID with that sentence, bantling."

He even goes as far as to stick his hand out to me.

I have half a mind to just turn and make a break for it, but his next sentence stops me.

"If ya don't hand it over, the rest of your ID's don't make it into the preliminaries."

Drat. This is not how I wanted this day to go. I reluctantly reach inside my cloak and grab my own ID. Pulling it out as slowly as possible I gradually hand it over.

As soon as it is within range he snatches it out of my hand.

This is fine, I think as he keys in my information. I'll just fail out of the preliminaries and that'll be that. No harm no foul.