by K.L. Bauman
Neither Ayden nor Pax spoke as they continued walking that day. Ayden fumed over 'losing' to a girl three times in a row. Who did she think she was? Veela Princess! Who cares? He could take care of himself better without her hovering around shooting her stupid arrows. And what the heck was wrong with Volos and Freya? If they didn't trust him, why couldn't Volos come along and keep an eye on him? "I can't believe she got me three times!" He mumbled those words over and over to himself. The more he thought about the whole thing, the fouler his mood became.
By the time they reached a good camping spot for the night, Ayden was in such a sour mood that he literally threw his stuff to the ground and stomped his foot in frustration. Unfortunately, Jynx's tail was casualty of Ayden's outburst. The cat's ear-splitting screech jolted Ayden's already tightly strung nerves. "Watch out, Jynx!" he yelled. The cat glared over his shoulder at Ayden and then slunk over to Pax, seeking comfort. "Fine! Go crawling over to him, then!" Ayden shouted and then slumped to the ground.
"I can't say that I blame him." The arrogantly sweet voice plucked at Ayden's nerves almost as severely as the cat's screeching.
He turned his head to look at the girl who'd been grinding on his nerves all afternoon, even though he hadn't seen her for several hours. She stood by the small fire that Pax had lit and Ayden got a really good look at her for the first time. He'd been too preoccupied with fighting her to notice details before. And, upon closer inspection, he wondered how she fought so well without tearing apart the delicate fabric of her clothing. Not that he minded really, but it wasn't exactly combat material.
Ayden's vision was dazzled by tear-drop shaped crystals; dangling from a thin silver strip across her forehead; along the bottom of the ice-blue top which covered only her chest and mid back; hanging from long silver threads attached to leather armbands just above each elbow; and at the top of each heal, a crystal was attached to her delicate leather sandals. The top of her pants ringed her torso just below her belly button; the pants tapered down each leg to end with a line of tiny pearls just above her ankles.
The Veela's unblinking eyes were wide and full of chilling blue fire. She couldn't have been any taller than 5'2", and her silvery hair flowed gracefully past her bare hour-glass waste. Her contrasting skin glowed deep bronze as if it had captured a bit of the sun.
Her bow shimmered gold and bright in the firelight, and Ayden guessed it to be made from a very special type of wood. The feathers on the tips of her silver arrows were also golden and almost seemed to come to life as the firelight danced across them. Even the leather quiver seemed of a very high quality and carried intricate carvings across its top and bottom. Maybe she really was of royal blood.
The girl sauntered over to where Ayden sat and looked down pert her nose at him. Not wanting to be intimidated, Ayden stood to his fullest height and returned the gesture. A flash of an image shot through his mind of choking her with his bare hands before he glared down at her and asked, "What do you want?"
The Veela held a dead rabbit to Ayden's face. "I thought you might be hungry."
"We have plenty of food. And, if we didn't, we could very well manage on our own." How dare she bring them a dead rabbit as if they needed to be spoon fed!
She put the rabbit on the ground and sighed heavily, "Suit your-self. I was just trying to be helpful." She turned to look at Pax who promptly stuck his nose in a book. Looking back at Ayden, she said, "By the way, my name is Da'ewyn."
As she turned away, Ayden realized that he'd been furious with her all this time, and he hadn't even known her name. In fact, he really didn't know much about her at all--except that he couldn't stand her. Still, if she really were there to help protect him and Pax for Volos and Freya, he should at least try to be tolerant of her. He relaxed his shoulders slightly and said in a begrudged voice, "You can stay by the fire with us if you want."
Da'ewyn stopped and turned to study Ayden. A look flashed across her eyes, suggesting that she wanted to accept his offer. Instead, she stiffened her shoulders and replied in a sassy tone, "Thank you, but no. I'm still on duty."
Breathing deeply in attempt to control his temper, Ayden said, "Look, just stay and eat with us. If you're going to be traveling with us, we may as well get to know each other." Was he really saying this?
Da'ewyn stopped and stood still as if thinking it over. Then she turned and smiled and said, "I accept your invitation."
Her face, though already beautiful, was twice as entrancing when she smiled. Ayden was suddenly glad he had asked her to join them. As they ate roasted rabbit and dried fruit, Ayden talked with their new guest. She seemed more relaxed and friendly than she had earlier. Ayden's own foul mood melted away with the heat of the fire.
"So, you're the baby, huh? I never had any brothers or sisters. How many do you have?" Ayden asked.
Da'ewyn wrinkled her nose at a piece of dried fruit before replying, "I have all sisters-twelve of them."
Ayden choked on his dried banana and looked over at Pax who hadn't said a word since the Veela had shown up that night. Then Ayden turned back to Da'ewyn. "You have twelve sisters? No brothers?"
"Veela men are very rare. There are only fourteen of them born in my generation. That is why the women train to become warriors--if they didn't, we wouldn't have anyone to defend us."
Ayden paused before asking the next question. Now that he had her warming up to him, he wasn't excited about getting her feathers ruffled again. Still, curiosity drove him to ask, "You seemed upset about being here. You said something about not proving yourself yet. What is that all about?"
Right away, the princess's mood darkened and her full bottom lip inched its way out ever so slightly. Ayden braced himself for a blast of emotion. But Da'ewyn kept her cool as she lifted the tear drop crystals from one of her arm bands. She watched the firelight dance across the shiny window-shaped edges and then explained, "Each of the crystals on my armbands represents a battle that I have won. I have only six of them."
"That's good, isn't it?" Ayden asked cautiously.
"Not when everyone else in your family has hundreds of them!" Her mood was becoming more unpleasant as she spoke, altering her features once again to being less lovely. "If they would all just stay out of my way and let me fight, I could have won dozens more battles! My sisters are jealous because they think I'm spoiled, so they interfere and take over so that I can't fight. And Father is overprotective of me." She cleared her throat and continued with a slightly softer voice, "You see, Mother died giving birth to me. I'm Father's last reminder of her."
For the first time, Ayden felt sympathy for the Veela princess. Not because she was spoiled or overprotected, but because she'd never had the chance to know her mother. "I'm sorry. I've lost my parents, too," he said softly.
Da'ewyn's moistened eyes clouded again as they shot daggers at Ayden, "Don't pretend to understand me, human. You have no idea what I have endured or what it's like to be in my position!" She stood abruptly and stomped away into the darkened forest.
Ayden looked over to Pax. "Was it something I said?" Pax shrugged his shoulders. Ayden raised an eyebrow at him and said, "Speaking of saying something, you haven't said anything all night. What's the matter, Jynx get your tongue?"
Pax shook his head, ignoring Ayden's attempted joke, and answered, "N-no. It's hhhar." And he gestured with his chin in the direction that Da'ewyn had disappeared into the trees.
"Don't let her bother you. She's not as fierce as she pretends to be," Ayden said, trying to convince him-self as much as he was trying to convince Pax.
"It isn't j-j-just har. A-a-all garls make m-me n-narvous. I-I t-try not to talk when th-thar 'round." Even though the fire had grown low and Pax's face was mostly in shadow, Ayden could see his cheeks flush and he understood. Pax didn't talk in front of girls because he was afraid of what they would think about way he talked. He wasn't sure how to handle this problem, as he'd never had one with girls. S
o, he just smiled and said lamely, "Hey, there's a girl out there for you. You just have to find her."
Pax gave him a disgruntled look.
Ayden shrugged and turned his attention to Jynx. Feeling bad about stomping on his feline friend's tail earlier, he held out a large chunk of his roasted rabbit for Jynx to devour. The cat finished his treat and cleansed himself thoroughly from ear tip to tail tip before letting Ayden know that he was forgiven. Curling up in his lap he licked Ayden's fingers with his sand-paper tongue and purred.
They traveled all the next day with the sun shining brightly. Pax seemed in a better mood and chatted more than he had the past few days. Neither of them saw Da'ewyn. Every now and then Ayden could hear her footsteps or would catch a whiff of leather and lilac and knew that she was close.
Just as the sun reached the top of the sky, Pax yelled out, "L-Look!"
Ayden jerked his head in the direction of Pax's pointed finger and gasped. Looming in front of them was a hill. Now, hills in general didn't get this sort of reaction from him, but this one was distinctly shaped like the head of a giant man. The rocks, trees, and grass came together to form squinting eyes and raised eyebrows. A small waterfall ran from the corner of one of the 'eyes'. Rock jutted out just below these to form a nose and below that was a cave shaped, of course, like a mouth opened wide with laughter.
They stood staring at the formation for several minutes, taking in the detail. Finally, Ayden said, "Well, this has to be the hill that Volos and Freya told us about. It's definitely a hill shaped like a giant laughing head." Leave it to his family to hide something so important behind a nature-made joke.
Ayden looked over to Pax whose eyes sparked with excitement. Ayden felt it, too. Things were about to become interesting!
Chapter Fourteen
The Laughing Hill