An Evening Sunset for a Prince (Open)

[Anonymous]

The incredibly round, orange sun had begun its descent toward the horizon. A single wispy gray cloud headed lazily out of Reajh, almost as if since the sun was falling, the cloud wanted to get to home and sleep. A slight, weak breeze, blew across the city of Reajh, stirring the trees, and blowing at people's hats and coat-tails. A lone mouse scurried across the street by Connlaoth Palace, dodging the feet a lone figure hurrying away from the castle. The young man, just past the line between man and boy hurried toward the edge of town. The sun was about the begin to set, and he had not missed one yet.

The figure continued along, trying not to get seen after all he was Ealius Maverikko, the prince. He would be in a pickle if he was found outside of the castle, during the evening of all times. He had run into a bit of trouble before, having to convice the palace guard that he was in fact, not the prince but some peasant returning to his home. Now that Eal thought of it, he was going to half to climb the palace walls to get back in. Grimacing, he hurried on, he was already late. Luckily he was good at climbing, though he did not have any love for it. As he reached the edge of town, he went past the borders of the city to a nice little rock by the outskirts of town and sat down. Today would be another great sunset.

"A perfect place of solitude." Eal said and smiled.

[Rhindeer]

"Rogue! Rogue, come back! Heel, goddammit!"

Fuck! The damn dog had gotten loose again, and for the second time that week Beatrid found herself chasing the red doberman down. Down the street it went, leash trailing behind it as it bounded away happily and it was all Beatrid could do to keep up with it.

Three months ago, her own dog, 'creatively' named Red, had finally had her litter and thus Beatrid had found herself tasked with taking care of them. Oh, she could have handed them off to any of the real dog trainers, but these were Red's puppies and she found that she didn't trust anyone else with them. Her sister had been a dog trainer for the military, anyway, so how hard could it be? She had taught Beatrid a little when it came to raising Red, and these were puppies. She could handle puppies. She was a mordecai, she'd handled worse.

So she thought.

She had finally given them all away to trainers except for Rogue, who she planned on keeping, but the pup was proving...difficult.

"Roooogue! Cookie! I'll give you a cookie!" she shouted, then slowed to a jog and then a stop when that got the large puppy to freeze, prick his ears, and turn to look at Beatrid with his head tilted. Beatrid leaned forward with her hands on her knees and smiled tiredly between gasping breaths. Now to get the mutt to come. They'd worked on this. He did it just fine when they were indoors. "Yeah, that's it. Cookie. You want a cookie? C'mere, puppy. C'mon..." she said, pitching her voice high and sweet like people did when they talked to animals or children. Rogue took a step forward, and Beatrid held out her hand like she was holding a biscuit, silently cursing herself for not bringing enough. "That's it. Come here..."

Another step, then another. He was halfway there and Beatrid held totally still so as not to ruin the moment--he liked playing 'chase me' way too much. More steps, he was walking steadily now and--

A bird flew by and Rogue pivoted and, yapping, chased after it. In the opposite direction.

Beatrid slapped her forehead and groaned, then straightened and took off. "ROGUE!"

Past the city gates he ran and Beatrid felt a jolt of panic go through her. It was almost nightfall and there were wild beasts out there and if she couldn't get him to come...

But instead of darting for the woods, which he loved when she took him there, he bolted toward a boulder and she soon saw why.

Someone was sitting on it. And Rogue liked people. Except her when he was being bratty.

He reached the man in not five bounding leaps and, fearless and impolite and attention whorish, trotted right up to him from behind--

And Beatrid wanted to die a little when the first thing Rogue did was stick his nose right up to the poor kid's butt.

"ROGUE! BAD," she shouted, walking now and panting something fierce. She swiped a hand across her brow and tossed her braid back over her shoulder as she approached, Rogue now busy walking around and snuffling at the boy's face. At least it kept the dog distracted, because as soon as she was close enough, she swooped down and snatched up the end of his leash and pulled him back. "Ugh...don't mind him, damned dog's got no manners," she muttered to the boy, not really looking at him, and looped the leash around her wrist this time.

[Anonymous]

Ealius was enjoy the rather nice weather, with its cool breeze, yet still warm feel on his skin from the setting sun. It was probably the perfect day -- evening -- he had seen and felt so far. He sighed, this kind of day possibly could not come again in his life time, though he doubted that. Nothing was impossible. Grinning his head off, Eal gave a small laugh, he was after all a prince. Unconsciously almost, he used his psychic powers to blow a few leaves off from a nearby tree and watched them float across the sky, past the gleaming sun. It was then he felt a sudden urge to turn around and look to see if there was anyone there. As if someone had placed a hand on his soul. He would be in a great deal of trouble if someone recognized him, and even worse if they had felt his psychic powers that did not seem psychic at all but magic. He was strange, part magic, part psychic in his mind.

All of a sudden something touched his ass, causing him to yelp and jump away, landing awkwardly on his knees a meter away or so. He turned quickly, so he was sitting on the ground staring at into the eyes of a dog, a red dog, or more exactly a red doberman. He sudden heard a feminine voice shout out at the dog. "ROGUE! BAD!"

He looked farther and a little up to find himself looking at a muscular but pretty woman walking quickly toward the dog before snatching the leash from the ground and pulling the dog, whose name was probably Rogue, away from his face, which the dog had decided to sniff to a great extent. The dog was pulled away before it could do anything else, and from what Ealius saw, it possibly wanted to lick him half to death.

"Ugh...don't mind him, damned dog's got no manners." The stunning woman said, her voice sounding a bit embarrassed.

He found himself staring at woman as she looped the leash around her wrist. Knowing that it was rude to stare, he blinked a few times and looked down, away from her.

"No it was alright, he probably helped me out by reminding me that I had to get back to the palace soon." Eal was a bit uneasy, what if this beautiful yet obviously dangerous woman was a Mordecai, and if Mordecai could sense a strange psychic-mage, and block out his powers also. Quickly dispersing all thoughts, he decided to try to act normal and how he usually would act with any other person, this could be an excuse to stay out later, even if he got into trouble. He probably was anyway, so what could staying out later do? Standing up he quickly brushed off his clothes

"In the confusion, I forgot to introduce myself, my name is Eal." Ealius said, smiling and extending an arm. "How do you do, miss . . . ?"

[Anonymous]

"Everything alright? We heard shouting..."

Devilyn had already done a quick visual check for anything suspicious, so the question was somewhat rhetorical, but hell...some habits died hard, and it wasn't long ago she was just a guard. Just like the young man to her right, Malenko. He was larger than Devilyn of course, and had a tendency to appear considerably more friendly in comparison. And while Devilyn was practically bristling with weapons, Malenko only carried a sword at his hip...he was, after all, off duty. Technically so was Devilyn, but some people were more paranoid than others...

She had all her weapons with her, though Devilyn had left her armor and her buckler back at the barracks. She had another set at home (again, paranoia), but she didn't feel particularly compelled to dress for battle when heading out for a drink. That didn't mean she'd be caught without her sword or twin pistols however, and each was plainly visible on her person. And while she was dressed for gloom and doom, Malenko wore a simple white shirt, light brown pants, and a pair of well worn, brown leather boots.

Frankly, if she knew who she were speaking to, she might have saluted at least one of them...but considering her rank wasn't what one would consider "high" within the Connlaoth military, even as a Dragoon, as far as she could tell it was just a man and a woman with an excitable pup.

[Rhindeer]

"Pal...ace...?" Beatrid, who had been reprimanding her dog, froze when the words sank in. Slowly, she looked up from the dog and took a good, hard look at the boy's face for the first time, eyes squinting. Palace? Eal? Eal as in Ealius?

The fucking prince?!

Her dog had just slobbered all over a goddamn prince?!

With a startled jolt, she snapped back upright and executed a hasty but practiced salute, her other hand coiling the leash around her wrist tightly. "Oh! Fuck! I mean--shit, pardon my language, I--Ealius? What are--" She slammed her mouth shut, face reddening with mortification as the words tumbled out. Shit shit shit, let's try that again. She cleared her throat, paused a second more to collect herself and fight back the surprise. "Dragoon Al'teir, m'lord," she said quickly, feeling both rude and awkward that she'd declined his handshake. It wasn't proper, though, shaking his hand like he was a commoner.

Relaxing her stance as best as she could while still feeling like an utter and complete moron, she took a deep breath and rolled her shoulders back. "Ah...where are your escorts, m'lord?" He shouldn't be out here alone, not a prince and out past the city gates where anything could go wrong. "We should get you back insi--"

Another voice cut in, clipping her words short, and Beatrid turned to see two others walking their way--one quite clearly a Dragoon. She knew those pistols. She couldn't tell if the man was a soldier, too, as both were out of uniform like her, but the woman looked vaguely familiar. While Beatrid wasn't close to many of the other Dragoons and mordecai and soldiers, she could at least recognize faces.

Aw man...

"Er...yeah. Everything's fine. Just, uh, y'know. Escorting the prince back." She gave a pointed look Ealius' way, deciding to be nice by giving them the warning she hadn't had.

[Anonymous]

Great, just great. Eal should not have said anything about a palace. Now everything was ruined. Ealius removed his extended hand and sighed. He had wanted some fresh air, something away from the palace, but obviously, from the shortened version of his name and his "need" to return to the palace, Dragoon Al'teir, figured it out pretty fast. He had wanted a normal conversation, normal as the key word but obviously, normal was not going to happen. Also, another person had decided to join the fun and see what was going on. Lucky for them, the Dragoon, Al'teir had kindly noted that he was the prince.

Ealius sighed, a face of annoyance. This was not going the way he had planned. He waved his hand at the woman in front of him. "At ease, at ease, I am fine, I am not completely vunerable, you know. "Eal pointed out. "Yes, yes, I am the prince, Ealius Maverikko, I am here to relax, not to get escorted back into the palace, I needed some fresh air, so I snuck out."

He said it straight foward, like it was no big deal. And it wasn't, at least, not to him. He was the prince, he could go anywhere he wanted. "Seriously, why does no one treat me normally, I am just a prince." He paused. "If you are going to be like that, at least tell me your name, the name you tell everyone else?"

Finally he directed his attention to the other person. "Now who might you be?"

[Anonymous]

"Er...yeah. Everything's fine. Just, uh, y'know. Escorting the prince back."

For a moment, Devilyn felt the same sort of nervous jolt to the system that Beatrid had felt. The one that was more or less the mind's way of telling her 'quick, be formal, or its your job.' But the irritated reaction from the prince put her at ease...especially since she was at least familiar with sneaking out for some fresh air. Just her luck she was born into one of the more 'traditional' families of the realm, and was encouraged to stay at home and look over a new suitor. Hell, she eventually pulled the ultimate sneak-out and joined the military, effectively ruining any plans to spend her days cooped up looking over men of nobility she had no interest in. Still, that didn't mean she'd be treating the prince just like, say, Malenko anytime soon, especially since she had yet to figure out what his temper was like, so the desire to refer to him as 'your royal snippiness' would have to wait.

"Now who might you be?"

Frankly, so would the desire to reply with 'the bloody queen of Connlaoth,' but that was simply because she had a feeling it would be incredibly rude (and unwise) to respond with the equivalent of 'your mother.' Especially to a prince who already seemed a bit irritated.

"Dragoon Descartes," she replied, saluting just as Beatrid had. She'd wanted to skip it, but frankly, a habit that's lasted for years didn't fade away quickly. Of course...neither did a certain desire to act a little out of bounds. Granted, most everything she did was well within the norm for the kingdom, but in her family, it was well outside the norm. Which is why she was busy putting together a little plan. Technically, since the prince had wanted to be known as Eal (not to her, but hell, she'd heard it), she had some deniability. 'Eal' was just a commoner, and even Beatrid's warning could be interpreted as referring to taking a pampered pup home. She finished just as Malenko was introducing himself.

"Guardsman Malenko, your h-"

"Now now, no need to salute. He's just a civilian, after all," she interrupted, leaving her comrade a little confused as she turned back to Beatrid and 'Eal.' "Which is why it's only natural we offer to take him for a drink or two. After all, it might raise his spirits a bit, and a happy populace means less paperwork for me, and fewer patrols for you, Malenko..."

Alright, so there was a -slight- chance that the prince might miss her intentions and get a little upset that she'd more or less referred to him as a commoner, and a pretty good chance she'd be catching hell from this other Dragoon in the morning (Devilyn, after all, still only held the rank of Sergeant in the military, and was thus rather low on the totem pole, even as a member of the Dragoons), but frankly, she didn't care too much. It'd been an uneventful day, an occasional worthy of celebration, and she planned on ending it on a high note.

"So, what say you? You can raise your spirits with good spirits, and watch Malenko here piss away most of this month's pay on gambling and the bar girls."