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The Monster Hunter girl I made and we use here. Though you are of course free to imagine your own, my sapphic little freaks.
“Wow! This stuff is amazing, Ele- Princess Eleanor!”
“Mhm. Gotta hand it to you, kid, you know your way around a sushifish.”
“If this is gonna be a frequent thing, then we might just have to keep you here for good”
“Please don’t joke about turning her into an actual hostage, Kora…”
Chatter bubbled not unlike the cauldron had between them. Word to word bubbling up towards the surface to burst and shower the Vermeil Princess in praise. Her under attention just felt right; Eleanor shone and Leia was just happy that the initial tension with her had faded. Enough for her to actually take her own bite.
“You’re all too kind, really. This was just a foraged potluck, nothing special. You should see me in an actual kitchen.”
“Oh my gosh, I hadn’t even considered that. They must have loved you back home”
“Mm… I’m just glad you all like it.”
Something twitched on Eleanor’s expression. Likewise, something dropped in the other princess’s chest as she let flesh melt against her tongue.
A flicker in the memory of both children of an old-blooded conflict. But Leia, usually observant, couldn’t piece together whatever the other was going through—too distracted.
A crackle of embers and a reel pulling. Fireflies surfing the early hour breeze.
“Pretty good, right, Leia?”
A coat so many sizes too heavy settling on her shoulders while she cupped a drink, whining about the cold but entranced by snow.
“Leia? Buddy, you there?”
“… Princess? Are you…”
A meal you caught yourself always tasted better, even more so when sneaking a fish twice your size past Father and the guards who definitely still knew but chose ignorance. It was improper, but that’s why it was worth it now and then. To keep perspective. That’s what Mother always… always…
A tickle down her cheek broke Leia out of her spell.
“Are you crying?”
Suddenly, she was cast away from the pond in the wilderness and the castle in mid-winter. What greeted Leia wasn’t haze and a face she couldn’t remember since they took the pictures down, but seven familiar ones; all in varying stages of concern or confusion.
There was a lurch in her stomach, settling awkwardly with the grilled fish as each pair of eyes burrowed into Leia’s skull. All the warmth and freshness of the taste in her mouth left just like that. The meat, spice and herbs souring as they sloughed down her throat in one sickening heap. She never liked so many eyes on her, eyes that sought and poked and pitied. Not when she was formally introduced to other courts, who saw her as a “half-breed” princess, nor when so cruelly elevated to “Daughter of the Turncoat Queen” by faces that couldn’t help but find her at fault in the moment or the retrospect.
Still…
“Oh? Sorry, I hit myself in the eye with this while trying to eat it.” Leia chuckled, wiping her face with a sheet. “The spices got in and irritated it. It’s no big deal, guys”.
Mother had her lessons, but she was no longer here to oppose Father’s. That keeping dignity means keeping peace between your enemy and respect between your allies, especially when it comes to the heart. It's the promise of nobility itself.
There was a swaying moment of doubt as expected, each ranger tasting the lie and deciding if it offended the tongue. And before Simon—discerning as his palette was when it came to her, could say anything, Ogden apparently found her facsimile convincing enough to guffaw and slap his knee.
“Well damn, princess! Your cooking’s good enough; it’s got the other princess forgetting all her table manners. Hah”
Thea was next to swallow it down. “That’s what I’m saying! It’s like—next level amazing”.
To seal the deal of Leia’s own recipe to secrecy, hardly as nutritious as the honesty of Eleanor’s, it was as simple as joining back in. “So it is. But let’s not act like I was that stuffy to begin with, guys.”
“True enough. I still remember your first week in the Rangers when we had to pull you two feet out of a mudbank searching for a Ludroth egg”. Kora’s thick mane jostled about as she laughed. “And she was grinning the whole time. Somehow I swear Ratha was too, the little runt he was back then”
And then everyone was laughing again—as if that little slip was really so plain. It always left Leia with a weird concoction of feelings brewing in her head. Satisfaction at freeing herself of suspicion, and a tiny, young part of her heart that wished someone would press. Force her to get it out. Simon would give that knowing look, but never actually push beyond that unless things were physically dire. Besides, Leia knew she would resist that if it came to pass anyway. Perhaps that's where she takes the most likeness from her parents. Not in father’s tawny brown hair or mother’s soft eyes, but in both their bouts of hypocrisy.
No one suspected Leia when she made the excuse of checking on the Rathian chick, taking her skewer with her. She avoided the eyes of her oldest friend on the way, making a break for the second oldest, who was dutifully watching the twilight horizon.
“Hey, Ratha. You doing okay, boy?” She rubbed that good spot just beneath his chin that made his tail dance and throat chirp in glee.
The wyvern shook about, startling the much smaller Rathian, who instantly hid behind Leia’s legs. The tiny thing looked frightened for all of two moments, though, as its eyes set on the fish sticking out of Leia’s hand.
On instinct, she moved the meal away from its snapping jaws, chuckling at the overeager attempts that sent it stumbling into Ratha’s leg. But, figuring someone should enjoy it, she tossed it up so the Rathian could catch it midair. All too happily, the creature gobbled it up and started gnawing on the wood for scraps; relatively still for a moment and looking content. She might have offered it to Rudy instead, but the Felyne was far too likely to tattle tale or lecture her on proper eating.
It was a good thing, really. Eleanor’s cooking was delightful. Just a shame that she lost her appetite after the first bite. An extra shame, too, that her belly growled in vain to a body that couldn’t stomach the taste of the past.
She ended up staying out there for hours. She and Ratha (at least she considered it a dual effort) counted stars before she moved on to practice sketching down the monsters in Ogden’s manual, all while Leia sat in the warm curl against his throat. But she was restless, really, the odd jostle earning a smoky huff from Ratha’s nose and a glaring side-eye. She’d apologise by rubbing his nose, trying to be still before she inevitably failed.
For as much as some privacy kept those earlier woes from growing, it did nothing to truly disperse them. Instead, they stayed ricocheting through her ribs, spoken not in quiet sighs but when sketches of wyverns turned into Mother’s dress from that fateful night. Leia made to cross it out or tear out the page, but somehow that felt wrong—traitorous even.
Judging by the northernmost star, they were encroaching on 11 o’clock and yet Leia wasn’t tired. All the lights in the camp had gone out an hour ago, Rudy making his way over to check on her and buying the same stories as before. Nightwatch always made for good excuses, especially with a rambunctious young wyvern prone to mischief. The Rathian in question was right by…
“Huh?” Leia’s hand met soft grass and dirt. “She was just… ugh, my goodness”.
What followed was two minutes of skulking around Ratha’s body to see if the little one had nestled into his much warmer bulk. No avail, and no foot tracks either. Always the problem with those who could fly. A panic drummed in her heart, not unlike back in the tent when all eyes were on her. Night was a dangerous place for a hatchling, but this time something pulled her out of the trance. A slight shuffle.
Holding her rising breath, Leia listened, imagining her senses expanding to hopefully quell her heartbeat a little more…
…
A crackle of burning wood. A trill! And… laughter?
By that point, all her moving about had prompted Ratha to very sassily step up, nudge her out of the way with a wing and plop down 20 feet away, staring at the surrounding hills. The cheek of that wyvern. His sleep was disturbed and all of a sudden he was worse than a spiteful teenager. But in his wake, she could see better down the grassy hill bathed in silvery moonlight and a soft orange glow. Behind a rock and just barely out of view was a small fire, a baby Rathian and the Princess of Vermeil who let the wyvern perch on her shoulders.
How Leia missed the thin smoke trail was beyond her. She must really be exhausted.
The journey downhill immediately proved that correct, a stumbling ankle sending Leia ass over tea kettle for half the hill and scrambling to get up for the rest. Eleanor was not nearly as imperceptive as Leia had been, getting up and turning the corner just to find her shaking out grass from her hair. If Eleanor found the state of her hilarious, she hid it remarkably well.
“Princess”, she offered cordially, almost like a question or an offered bone.
“Princess”, Leia replied, forcing out some of that Azurian dignity despite the dirt over her armour. “I see you found our little escape artist”.
Eleanor tilted her head, then turned to the Rathian who had since hopped off to pick at a stone with her claws. “Her? Oh! Well, I went out, and the sweet thing just toddled over to me. I thought I might entertain her for a while”
“Mhm. Well, either way I’m grateful”. Leia nodded, stepping close to pet the little wyvern’s crest. “Out of curiosity, why the campfire, though?”
“Ah. The moment after she ran to me, she started clambering towards the tent. I barely caught her before she launched herself into the empty cauldron.” Eleanor’s face held all the exasperation of a tired parent, including the slight mirth that came with handling mischief. “I think she wanted whatever we were having.”
I missed all that, too? Leia began to wonder, something really must be wrong with me. She kept up a cool front as she ushered the wyvern into her arms.
“The moment I brought the fish out of the cooler, she practically went feral”, the blonde sighed. “Almost like someone gave her a taste enough to know what she wanted”.
Four seconds passed before the steely eyes that Leia assumed to be at the fire were seen to ever so slightly be aimed at her. Two round points of slate blue that took an unexpected sharpness, strong enough to carve an invisible line that had her flinching. Blast it. She’d been caught. Leia didn’t want to lie that directly, but-
Then Eleanor began to laugh, “It’s alright, princess. I’m not upset. Goodness, you look like you’re about to blow.” She stepped closer, scritching the Rathian’s ear as Leia lost the breath she didn’t even realise she’d been holding. “I might not really be a ranger, but even I know you shouldn’t feed monstie’s human food.”
A little guilty; a lot, maybe, Leia nodded. “Sorry”, was all she could mutter. Two fish sat on a large leaf along the ground, stuffed and dusted with the same mix as before. The sight alone made her mouth water and, embarrassingly, call her stomach to rumble loudly. It was enough to almost spook the Rathian, flitting its head about in alarm and smacking her in the face.
Quietly cursing, Leia rubbed her eye and set the Rathian back down. One look at Eleanor once her vision unblurred taught her that Father’s words were useless before the woman. Dignity was not an option anymore. Not after the past two minutes. Eleanor laughed, brighter than the moon above.
“Alright, Princess. How about you pay me back for dinner by helping me get this one on? I might even let you split the Rathian’s share”, she teased. The first tease from Eleanor, Leia realised, and she laughed again. Gentler this time.
…
Eleanor’s laugh was pretty, Leia decided. Really quite pretty.
With a nod, the princess of Azuria sat herself down and got to work, hoping the fire’s heat could excuse the crimson painting her ears. Eleanor joined her, eventually taking over the finesse of it while Leia was assigned to Rathian duty.
Speaking of, a low rumble signified Ratha’s journey down the hill that sent the chick running away before slowly returning to nestle beneath him. The older wyvern paid no mind and instead lay down so that his head could rest beside his rider, chuffing before shutting his eyes again. Before Leia could ask about Eleanor’s own monstie, she noticed the Anjanth had taken up residence where Ratha had been, one side of her head always facing Eleanor.
As much as Leia couldn’t help the reminiscence of this moment, especially as the scent hit her nose, that kind of attention also served to highlight how different it was too. Instead of rotating the fish over a spit like Mother, Eleanor tightly bound her catch in thick, wet leaves before burying them amongst the coals. She didn’t even flinch at the heat that rolled down against her bare fingers, humming some likely Vermeilian tune.
“Your hands? Wouldn’t they burn?” Leia asked, feeling rather foolish but curious more so. “It's impressive”, she added.
“Hm. Cook like this long enough and the heat just doesn’t get to you”, Eleanor mused, a small smile playing at her lips. “Having Angie when she was teething and learning her flames the following year added to that too, I suppose”.
“I’ll bet,” she hummed. Then added a little more. “I had the genius idea to teach Ratha how to breathe fire while I was on his back. He hit the targets, but would use far too much power and blow all the fire back at us” She remembered the rush of success followed by the reprimand, both from flame and from Father. “Burned my eyebrows off right before portrait day.”
The now fully grown wyvern by her side grumbled in his sleep, shaking the log they sat upon and drawing out Eleanor’s amused giggle. She poked the fire again, embers swirling amidst before twinkling out just where they overlapped the stars.
“What’s it like? Flying, I mean?” Eleanor leaned back to properly gaze upward, a wistful look in her eyes. “Vermeil is hardly as diverse with monsters, especially when it comes to anything with wings. The weather makes it really hard for them, but… anyways, I’ve just always been curious”.
Leia understood that. Mother and Father had taken her for rides on castle Legiana before, but Ratha was hers. She’d practically race with the chick to the stables every day to see if he was big enough for them to fly together. “It’s… freeing? That sounds maybe a little too poetic, but it feels right to see. Big guy is sleepy and when he’s sleepy, he’s grumpy, but perhaps another day I could take you for a flight?”
Despite her cheery but still noble demeanour, Eleanor lit up like a firework, slapping her hands on her knees. “Really?”
“Really, really. Who do you think got Simon used to the wind pressure?”
“Hmm… Kora?”
Leia paused. “Okay, that’s mostly true, but I definitely helped too.”
“Alright, Princess, I believe you”, Eleanor said, but her smirk spoke of mischief. A side to the Vermeilian that Leia really hadn’t expected. The kind of playfulness that didn’t disguise itself as innocence, but might actually just be it.
With that, Eleanor reached for her greatsword and used it like some sort of spatula to scrape away the hottest parts of the fire and pull the fish back. The speed and accuracy spoke of practice, even with something so unwieldy. At the same time, the lack of armour gave sight to skin, and Leia was all too aware of the snap and cord of defined muscles within Eleanor’s arms as she lifted the weapon into her lap. The distraction was… plentiful. Enough that she barely even noticed when the greatsword was similarly slid to rest in her lap as a rudimentary table between them.
“Bon appetit”, she smiled, reaching over to undo the bind on both their meals and losing a wave of fresh and charred scents into Leia’s nose. Unlike the skewers of earlier, the fish was prepared in such a way that it was left softened and delightful. Every fibre of meat was visible if she squinted and looked ready to melt in her mouth. An itch down her chin told her that she was drooling, actually drooling, and Eleanor seemed just as amused as Leia was starving.
“I… uh, wow.” The past tried to pick at her appetite, but its victory was nowhere near assured. “I’ll uh, split some off for me and give the rest to…” In the minute she’d been distracted, the Rathian had wandered again, only this time curled up into Ratha’s chin and fast asleep. “Oh. Perhaps not.”
“Lucky you, Princess”, Eleanor smiled, her eyes suddenly quite soft as she turned from the dozing pair back towards her. “Provided you actually eat it this time.”
Leia still felt guilty for that, pausing for a moment, Eleanor apparently didn’t have as she stuck her fingers into the fish’s side, popping meat into her mouth with a contented sigh. Ah. That explains the no utensils. A little awkwardly at first, the Azurian princess followed suit and took a bite.
However lighter, memories swelled all the same. It wasn’t so shocking this time as to let them take shape as tears, but it still left a solemn weight. “Something to chew on”, as they say, even if her mouth was already busy. But it didn’t stop Leia from eating as fast as she could without seeming too impolite for even Mother’s standards. It was the most she could do to swallow and utter a thanks before going back to satiating herself.
“Whoa. Alright, I guess you do really like it”, the other girl chuckled. “And here I was worried you actually hated my cooking and were just being nice.”
That stopped her. “You thought that?”, Leia asked behind her hand.
“Indeed. I wasn’t so easily fooled by the whole hitting yourself in the face thing.” There it was again, a decisive cut through her facade. Not even a question, but a direct statement that didn’t ask for confirmation. “And then you snuck outside, and I watched you feed it to the Rathian. That doesn’t leave me with too many schools of thought, Princess”.
Leia was quiet, taking her time to finish her mouthful. Buying time, more accurately.
“I cooked up some vegetables before we fought that Yian Garuga yesterday and you were fine. Here I was thinking you just hated fish but didn’t wanna tell me, or some other nonsense.” Eleanor used a chunk of fish to scoop up some of the juices before downing it in one bite. She swallowed, then grew oddly steady in her seat. “But, you don’t have to tell me what was going on with you. I suddenly feel as if I’ve been prying far too much for a three-day-old… whatever exactly you would call this arrangement.”
“It’s alright”, Leia was compelled to answer the moment she felt the conversation pull away; why, she wasn’t quite sure. But, she took a breath and tried to clear her head along with her throat as she said, “Mother just always liked fish. She’d cook it with me just like this—well, similarly to this. It's… it’s been a very long time”.
Leia didn’t have to look at Eleanor’s face to know gears were turning, though she might have anyway if embarrassment didn’t keep her gaze nailed to her knees. There was no world in which a princess of Vermeil didn’t know about Mother; it wouldn’t make sense. Hell, there’s a world where Eleanor might have seen her more recently than Leia did, and it could very well be this one. Nothing close to resentment or anger flared at that. Leia’s heart could never hold that flame when it came to Mother, confusing and longing doused it too easily. It was just that quiet sort of sinking, and this time, Leia was all too happy to distract herself with her meal.
“Apologies. I shouldn’t have pressed you there”, Eleanor spoke up after a time in a voice that sounded almost smaller than usual—unsure and quiet. “I know I could not have known, but… I perish the thought that I’d ever hurt you like that, Princess. Truly. I know what it's like to struggle with family”.
There was an even greater softness to those words than Eleanor’s earlier stare. Sincerity. A confluence of concern without cloy, and respect without too much distance. It… It was nice. It may be true that Eleanor had nothing to say sorry for, nor could she fix it. But her sympathy felt like so much more than the hollow variety of the courtiers or even the cautious kind from her allies more often than not. It was nice. It made her want to keep going.
Leia made to grab another handful of food, instead finding close to nothing left. Time had flown, it seemed. The princess smiled ever so slightly as she looked to the smouldering coals.
“Well, I would be just as pressing and improper if I kept talking about it; maybe we can be even then”, Leia smirked, doing her best to hide that solemn tone that strode in tandem with this topic. “I can’t remember the last time I talked to someone about… what happened - even indirectly like this. I guess all that time pent up the waterworks.”
Nodding slowly, Eleanor moved her hands to her knees. She had finished her meal as well, wiping her hands on a kerchief. The greatsword still shared their laps, but Leia didn’t mind the weight. For a moment, she wondered if it was a pre-emptive move from the Vermeilian to keep her from taking off for the hills at the proposition of honesty. It was a silly thought, nonsensical for the junior state of this relationship, but it amused her nonetheless.
“She founded the rangers, you know? It was always so clear to me that love for the world was what drove her”. Word by word spilled freely, bled from the open wound. But perhaps ridding the impurities was worth the hurt. “The way she cared for the monsters, fought for them and for me too. Those odd nights waking me up to rappel down the castle window, just to see me smile and find an excuse to cook in the wilderness like this.”
A shuffle led to a guess that Eleanor has moved a touch closer. “Wow. She sounds like a wonderful mother”.
“Yeah. She really is… was”. Leia winced. “I never truly know what to say for the tense. So many act as if she’s gone forever or they wish she were, well, permanently. Father didn’t want to take down all the shared portraits at first, but they were all vandalised within two months. It just felt worse to keep them up in that state.” A dull pain made her realise how hard she was squeezing her own leg.
“Right. I can imagine how the people must have reacted. Having their queen not just leave, but for their sworn enemy.” Leia nodded at Eleanor’s words. “Of course, for you, she was much less a queen—but family.
“I never thought I’d have to keep a personal picture of her, so there never was one. Now… I don’t even remember what she looks like. Isn’t that strange?”
Without the mechanical back and forth of eating the memories of the keep and that cold, cold night crept back in. The clang of metal, the explosion; so many curses and cries as Mother took off to the sky with the supposed omen in tow. Almost every face turned to her or Father in the following moment, blaming her for interrupting and whatever caused that odd glow and the Rathalos breaking free.
Firewood snapped and scattered embers to the sky once more. The heat could only be resisted for so long.
She couldn’t really disprove them, only hidden from punishable fault by being only ten years old. But as time passed, their whispers dug deeper and clawed the air from her lungs on sleepless nights abundant with memory. Since then, she’d never felt comfortable having so many eyes on her. Father was at least kind enough to request her presence in court as little as possible, despite how it angered some to be deprived of the heir they saw as simply running off to the woods.
Leia wanted to ask—ask if maybe Eleanor had seen her. Was she well? A simple question left unanswered for ten years both too fast and too slow. It would be far too inappropriate. “I just hope she’s safe”, is what she settled for, feeling that ache continue to grow in her thigh and her fingers clenching tight. “And…”, her voice choked, “Just maybe thinking of me too”.
It felt like tears were brewing yet again with that signature bubble in her throat. But something popped it, startled her from this spiral she’s unknowingly slipped into. A touch. Two fingers then a whole hand, slipping politely over her knuckles and underneath. They were gentle on her palm. Calloused and worn, perhaps a little presumptuous, but Leia found she didn’t mind. She turned then, expecting but still surprised as her eyes met Eleanor’s.
“Princess…” she started, hand uncertain but gaze unbroken. “Be gentle to yourself”.
The other woman’s hand made to move her own, and the an action against instinct Leia released her vice grip on her leg. The short breath that followed and the tingly wave of relief made her aware of just how hard she’d been gripping. She winced. That would bruise by tomorrow for certain.
“I… thank you”, Leia did her best to meet the certainty of Eleanor’s eyes, but couldn’t maintain it for long. “I don’t talk about this often”.
“So you said.” Eleanor’s sternness gave way to a smile. Slowly, she moved her hand back, because of course she would, and an almost feral urge in Leia’s heart and hand told her to follow. She used her other hand to bring them both to her lap atop the greatsword. Right now, she wasn’t sure that they wouldn’t betray her if left unguarded. “But I’m glad I could help, if I did.”
“... I think it did. Thank you.”
Coming up for air would always be a relieving thing; this was no different. Despite how choking it’d felt to air these feelings, she was left a little less bogged down in their absence. Freer, lighter and gods so tired. That too had been amusing to Eleanor, like so many of her other mishaps this evening, raising a brow when Leia almost fell to her side while shuffling off the log.
Maybe it was also her exhaustion making her more pliable, because when Eleanor suggested they just sleep and alternate watches down here instead, Leia didn’t find it in herself to resist. She did make a good point thought that moving back uphill would almost certainly wake up the Rathian.
Eleanor made the trip back up to the camp tent, taking her time to greet her monstie on the way. It wasn’t long before she came back down, but it was enough for torpor to take root again in that short span of silence. Leia thanked her, moving to set it down before she realised there really wasn’t that much space between the rock and Ratha curled around the fire. It left her only one spot; right beside Eleanor. Leia would hardly complain but offered to take first watch and spare herself the racing heart of almost sleeping side to side. It was risky when the back of her mind was devoting memory to the gentle roughness of Eleanor’s hands.
The girl seemed sceptical that her fellow princess could stay up that long, and she was probably right, but she acquiesced in the end. Eleanor tucked herself in, not at all bothered and allowing a little more time to talk about nothing in particular. About their mutual and instinctively low level of table manners, earned from learning to fend for themselves for one reason or another and the plights of raising fire wyverns. Soon enough, the blonde had rested her head, looking almost without a care as licks of dwindling flame illuminated her face in tandem with moonlight.
It wasn't like Leia believed otherwise, but she was uniquely forced to face it as she looked down to the other woman. That it wasn’t just her laugh. Eleanor was pretty.
Quietly, Leia wished their hands had stayed together for just one warm moment more.
Just as predicted, Leia had started falling in and out of sleep within minutes. Convenient it was then that Eleanor had always been a light sleeper and had been pretending to sleep from the beginning.
She peeked an eye open to find the other princess swaying like a tree in the wind—only slightly and unlikely to fall, so far at least. Eleanor wasn’t sure if Leia was a light sleeper too, but with how similar they’d been this far she didn’t want to take the risk. Slowly, she crept out of her bedroll to the log where Leia sat, easy to see despite the dead fire with such an open and starlit sky.
Eleanor had intended to scoop up and place the other girl in her bed if she remained asleep, or at least wake her up and direct her to sleep properly. But the reality of the situation quickly got out of hand. She tapped Leia’s shoulder, and she started to fall! Not away, but towards her. Obviously, Eleanor caught the slumbering princess, who mumbled something content before leaning further against her side. One thing led to another, and now, the heir of Azuria was settled in her lap like a dozing dog.
Definitely a heavy sleeper, she thought.
It was a complicated situation. Leia was lovely—handsome even, and Eleanor didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but what else had life taught her? Suspicion? Not quite. More so, pragmatism, a bonded pair to the open mind and heart she tried to keep in this new, abundant land. She couldn’t afford to get so comfortable as to blind herself.
Delicately, she moved a stray hair off Leia’s ear, running the soft brown to darker umber between two fingers. Eleanor smiled. The same two fingers met her jaw, running the cut before journeying to the hollow of her throat. Curiosity? Preparation? Just a little touch starved? Even she herself wasn’t sure, but Eleanor couldn’t help it. Again, she pressed the softness of skin, but her explorations were halted by a hand reaching for hers.
There was a tidal rise of fear before the ground gave way beneath it to a muffled laughter. Leia’s laughter.
“Mnnf… Rudy, your tail… tickles”.
While she was stunned, a still sleeping Leia took Eleanor’s hand and brought it to her chest. The girl sighed heavily and relived, trapping Eleanor both by force and by morality. That same soundless law that demands all remain still if a cat sits in their lap. This was the ace rider of Azuria, the greatest threat to her kingdom, should war truly break that border wall only a few hille away. This was also Leia, simply a woman in need of rest and, apparently, her hand.
A scarred thumb traced the line of her palm back and forth, a loop that bordered hypnotic as Eleanor took a deep breath and relaxed herself. If she wasn’t going to leave, she may as well enjoy herself. Of course, she’d have to find a way to leave eventually. Leia waking up to, or worse, the two of them being found like this would surely spell problems. So for however many seconds, minutes or (dare she say hopefully?) hours longer Leia rested atop her lap, Eleanor would simply gaze at the stars and wonder for a world where the sky back home was as free as this moment.