The Cold Mercanary

A cold summers night breeze blows through the eastern riverside village. As the sound of the slow river spinning a water wheel can be heard in the distance, a young lady in a green and orange robe strolls through the peaceful night.

As she looks up at the crescent moon shining like silver she kneels down at starts looking at a bed of yellow flowers blossoming under the moonlight. A shadowy figure moves from rooftop to rooftop without making a sound, making its way closer to the unsuspecting girl.

"Maybe I could make them something for when I finally find a way to get home," The girl says to herself quietly as she picks a flower from its stem. The shadowy figure jumps down to the ground, and slowly approaches the her.

"Since you're finally on the ground," The girl says as she continues to pick flowers, "Would you mind helping me pick flowers Fred?" She turns to the shadowy figure with a smile.

The person steps into the moonlight. Despite wearing a mask that covers most of his face, it's easy to tell he's annoyed.

Fred says something, but the mask muffles it.

"Can you just take off your mask? Just cause you're a ninja doesn't mean you have to dress like one all the time," She says with annoyance. He glares at her for a second before complying and taking off his face mask and stuffing it into a belt pocket.

"Someone could have easily sneaked up on you and stolen you, or killed you," Fred says.

"No one in this town is that kind of person, and the only person who ever tries to sneak up on me is you, and you've only scared me twenty times out of fifty,"

"You've seriously been keeping track?"

"No, it's just a guess, now come help me pick flowers, I want to make flower crowns,"

"For what?"

"For my family, so when I'm done with this war and find a way home I'll have something to give them,"

"...Fine," He says hesitantly, As they're picking flowers Fred seems bothered by something. The girl can't help but take notice.

"Something on your mind?" She asks.

"It's nothing Princess Berryla,"

"It's about yesterday, isn't it?"

"...Yes,"

"Fred, I know I'm a princess, but I'm not gonna let that stop me from getting bit dirty petting some animals,"

"Your royal robe was covered in mud afterwords, and let's not forget that one of them headbutt you,"

"It was a baby goat Fred, it's not like it could have killed me," She says with a chuckle, "You're so paranoid sometimes," The two stop talking and Berryla starts to fidget with the flowers. After some time she holds up a flower crown.

"Think it's too small?" She asks.

"I don't know," He replies, continuing to pick flowers. He stops when he feels something being put on top of his head.

"Hm, a bit small, but your black hair really makes the yellow pop out, even in this lighting," She says cheerfully before taking it off his head, "I wonder if it would look as good on Des' head. Mmm, brown doesn't go good with yellow," She starts examining it closely.

"Is this enough yet?" Fred asks with a arm full of flowers.

"Yes, it's the perfect amount. The clouds are starting to block the moon," She says as they stand up, "Let's take them back to my room so I can make the others,"

As they start walking back, someone in raggedy clothing steps in their path. It's a young man, looks with a sword in his hand.

"Stand behind me," Fred says as he drops the flowers.

"Hey, don't drop them!" Berryla exclaims.

"Well aren't you friendly," The man says, raising the sword up onto his shoulder, "Can a merc not walk around at night?"

"Excuse my friend," Berryla says as she starts to gather the flowers off the floor, "He's not very good at talking to new people,"

"No worries," The man says, "But first you gotta give me everything you got," He says, pointing his sword at them.

"...Um...we only have flowers," Berryla replies as she stands up.

"Sure, sure, and this sword is actually just a piece of wood. Don't take me for a fool, I recognize the clothing of a high ranking member of Klyfland anywhere, now fork over what you have," He says with a slightly irritated tone.

"I told you, we only have flowers. We don't have any gold. I could make you a flower crown if you want,"

"A flower crown? Ha, you really think I want a flower crown?"

"Um..." She looks at his torn dirty clothing, "Than how about my jacket?"

"Your jacket? What good would that do me?"

"Well, you must be cold. And if you don't want to keep it, you could always sell it for gold. I'm sure you could get a good amount for it," The guy just stares at her, thinking about the offer. Berryla kneels down, laying the flowers on the ground and starts fidgeting with them once more.

"What are you doing?"

"Making, a crown," She says. The man just watches as her hands quickly sift through the pile of flowers, quickly picking up and adding a new one to a string of them, meanwhile Fred lowers his hand to his side, grabbing his shuriken.

"And, done," She says holding up something a small circle made of flowers, "Here," She offers it to the man.

"What is it?" He asks with a skeptic look.

"It's a bracelet, since I'm sure you don't want to wear a crown,"

"What's your end goal?"

"What?"

"You're trying to befriend me, aren't you? Just so you can use me," He says with increasing anger, "I'm not some damn fool whose going to fall for that!" He pulls his sword back and goes to swing. Fred throws his shuriken, hitting him in the arm, causing him to drop his sword.

Berryla tries to hurry over to the man.

"Get away from me!" The man exclaims before he takes off.

"Go get the tonic from my room," Berryla says.

"What?! He just tried to-"

"Now!" Berryla commands, turning to him with a righteous fury.

"A-alright," And he quickly takes off. Putting the flower bracelet in a pocket of her robe she takes off in the direction the man went. Running between buildings, she sees no sign of him. As she stops to catch her breath, she hears the faint sound of someone else catching their breath. It's doesn't sound too far away.

Walking into a small alley she takes a turn down another one and at the end of it sees the man leaning against a wall, holding up his arm with the shuriken in it, blood slowly dripping onto the ground. The man looks up from his wound and sees Berryla approaching.

"Stay back!" He shouts, standing up straight.

"I'm sorry for what my friend did back there, but I promise I won't hurt you," She states, "I want to help treat your wound before it gets infected, or you pass out from bleeding," Walking at a somewhat slow pace she manages to close the distance between them.

"Come on, my friend went to grab my tonic, it should help," She says holding out a hand.

"Why are you being so nice?" He asks with a look of disbelief.

"Because I'm not a fighter. I don't want to hurt people, I just want to end this war and go home to my family, I'm not trying to get anything from you, I just want to help you," The man just stares into her eyes for awhile, than takes her hand with his uninjured arm.

The two walk out of the alley way and start heading back to the flower patch. Fred quickly finds them. The man let's go of Berryla's hand and steps away from her when Fred starts walking up to them.

"Here," He says holding out a small bottle.

"Thank you, no go pick up all the flowers you dropped," He starts to speak but she cuts him off, "I don't need you throwing anymore shurikens at the poor man, now go, I'll be in my room," With a huff he takes off.

"Come on," She says to the man. The two head to a small building and enter, though the man was hesitant at first. The man takes a seat at a small wooden table while Berryla picks up a lantern from the nightstand and places it on the table.

Moving the other chair closer she takes a seat.

"This is gonna hurt a bit," She says, hovering her hand by his hand. He nods in response. The second her hand touches the shuriken he winces from the eruption of a searing pain in his arm. She quickly pulls out it, leaving a large open cut that blood is quickly filling.

Taking the cork of the bottle, she slowly tilts it over his wound until some of the green liquid inside drips out onto his wound. He winces in pain once more from the sting, but it quickly goes away, and the burning in his arm greatly reduces as the wound starts to heal, leaving only a cut half the original size.

"I'd give you more," She says as she puts a cork on the bottle, "But this is all I have," She gets up and puts it in the nightstand and starts grabbing some stuff from it.

"Why did you have that ninja come get that, if you were just going to bring me here?"

"I didn't want him to do any more harm than he already did," She says walking over with some rolled-up cloth and a dagger. She unrolls a bit of cloth, holds it by the man's arm, then adjust the length and cuts it off. She wraps it around his arm making a makeshift bandage.

"Make sure you wash it often and re wrap every couple of days until it's fully healed, alright?"

"Uh," He examines the bandage, "Okay, but I don't know how to do, this," He gestures to the bandage.

"Just meet me at the flower beds in the morning, oh, and speaking of flowers," She pulls out the flower bracelet, "Here," The man looks at it and than at her before he takes it and puts it on his arm.

"...Thanks..." He says, looking away from her warm smile. He gets up and leaves without another word. Shortly after Fred comes back. While the two have another talk about the do's and don't's of a princess, the man heads off to his little bunk, unable to look away from the bracelet on his arm.