In the morning Nicoleta opened her door after an excruciating shower, and turned to the captain, "can you teach the language you and the Queen were speaking?" She asked, voice low.
The captain looked slightly surprised at her request, but did not refuse her at all, "as you wish your highness" he told Leonardo to fetch a note book and a pen.
They both sat down on the floor to Nicoleta's demand, and the Captain wrote down some symbols on the note book, atop it was written The basic words in the Wovis Language
Nicoleta took the notebook, and flipped over to read over the words. He had written the English words at the top, and beneath them was the Wovis translation.
"Or would her highness prefer it in her Native tongue?" Nicoleta shook her head, skimming over the words over and over.
"How do you say any of these?" She asked, looking up at him with her brows knitted together in confusion.
The captain smiled lightly, ran his index finger over the first word. "Princess- it is Pronounced like Sa- " Nicoleta repeated after him, "to- span- sta" she repeated it, stumbling over the word multiple times before she got it right.
The captain nodded in approval, "very good- " he moved on to the second word.
"Bedroom- it is said like Hab- ta- sta Sta" she repeated the word, along with Satospansta, the Captain nodded each time she got both right, correcting her when she stumbled again.
"What about that one? Why does it have two words beneath it?" She pointed to door which had, Tysiah and Bisakas beneath it.
"Wovis operates with formal and informal words- words that have singular translations are already formal on their own- the ones with two different words for one means there is an informal one and a formal one" she nodded, staring down at them, "why is there an informal one to begin with?" The captain chuckled.
"Language is developed from generation to generation, at some point in Flamae, the informal one must have been formal" he explained. She nodded, trying to process the two words she'd just learned.
"Let's do this everyday- I want to learn at least twenty words a lesson" she rapped out, turning to the captain in a haste.
The captain nodded, "as you wish your highness- " she cut him off, "and stop calling me that"
"You're the princess" he stated, almost offended by the suggestion. She sighed, staring down at the words.
She couldn't get him to stop doing something that must have been indented to him since he was probably a baby.
At least now in a week or so she would be able to make out a one word or two whenever he and the Queen would interact.
"How do you say people in Wovis?"
"Tegnes Te- gn- es- Tegnes"
Lunch time disrupted Nicoleta's lesson, Leonardo being the one to announce that she needed to eat which the captain immediately agreed with.
He said their lesson couldn't continue if she refused to eat, so Nicoleta reluctantly followed the two of them to the small canteen, where most of the kids in the elite force were eating.
Once she stepped foot through the open double doors, all eyes landed on her, all of them harboring hatred in them. She shrunk behind the two men, tightening her hand grip around the captain's arm.
He tapped the back of her hand gently, smiling down at her. It worked in making her more tense, if he was reassuring her like that, that meant he saw the looks too.
He saw the fireless burning gazes of all the people she had scarred forever.
She shifted her gaze from table to table, until her gaze stopped on a table with faces that didn't stare at her like she deserved to die, though she didn't think it was too cruel.
She let go of the captain, and made her way over to them. "Can I sit here with you guys?" They all urged her to sit down, Laura managing to get her to sit beside her.
Leonardo brought her tray of food, and left with the captain to stand by the door, watching her, waiting for her to finish her food.
They ate mostly in silence, but Xavier could only be quiet for a second.
"So when are you joining the rescue team?" He asked, pointing his fork at Laura, she shrugged, "depends what Lane says" Nicoleta furrowed her brows, "there are still rescue teams out there- many other survivors out there" Laura answered simply.
She nodded. The table had an empty seat next to Issacher. Nicoleta wondered who it was before remembering Zelen.
"Is Zelen okay?" she asked, "he's the one helping out the rescued survivors in the infirmary" said Issacher.
"It's good to see your face" said Laura, mouthful, "I thought they stole you away" Nicoleta forced herself to chuckle, as Laura laughed under her breath.
Silence fell upon the table again, and no one said anything more after that.
Inside her bedroom The Captain taught her more about Wovis.
"Some of the words don't seem Wovis- " she looked up at him, trying not to sound stupid, "Wovis has a lot of the ß symbol, but some words don't really sound Wovis?" a smile crept on the Captain's face, "some originate from different languages. But these words Peloi and Heditio stem from Woven, a different dialect of Wovis." He tapped on another word beneath the two, Chest - peiona
"That one doesn't stem from Woven but another dialect of Wovis which is Waevan- Waevan used to be the royal family's language but it changed to Wovis in King Kariyen's time."
"Why?" He laughed heartily, "the great King had a stammer and pronouncing the words in Waevan was more difficult for him whereas Wovis was much easier for him because of the repetitive s" he smiled, seemingly remembering something funny as he wrote something down on the note book.
"Tell me which one of the different dialects this word Opeoina stems from Waevan or Woven?" Nicoleta scrunched her face in thought, marking down patterns she saw, only to realize they made no sense, and being thrown back to the beginning.
"Umm… Woven?" She looked up at him hopefully, the Captain smiled, then shook his head.
"It stems from Waevan- Waevan repeats As and Es at the end of words, whilst Woven ends almost every word with I or O with the occasional S." Nicoleta shook her head, "the royal family has their own language?" She asked, "yes- the language chosen by the royal family will be the primary language of the nation"
No wonder it was so easy for Kariyen to switch them.
"Oh then what happens to the inherent dialect?" The Captain marked Dien another word before answering, "what happens to different dialects of languages of earth?" Her eyes lit up with understanding immediately, nodding before returning to the notebook.
lord- Doirls "how is this pronounced?"
"Do- ir- ls Doirls" her brows knitted together, "is that how to refer to some type of royalty?" She asked, rolling the word on her tongue over and over.
"No. Our lord Sudofr is the only one referred to as such"
"Who is that?" He seemed displeased with her question, but answered anyway, "our creator- lord sudofr is the creator of our great planet Flamae" his words sounded rehearsed, robotic even, it didn't sound like a genuine response, according to his reaction whenever he said the lord's name he might have not even liked the man.
Nicoleta cleared her throat and flipped a page, "umm.. are there other languages and dialects?" The Captain nodded, his shoulders less stiff, "Parish is the Language of the north- of the People's Republic Of Parinah"
"What is the royal family's nation called?" He smiled, "Woven" Nicoleta couldn't help but smile too.
During one of their lessons, Nicoleta remembered the reason why they were being hosted in the house in the first place. She lifted her gaze from the note book, and stopped scribbling on it.
"How are the negotiations going?" The Captain who was stacking up fifteen notebooks, didn't lift his gaze as he answered, "her majesty says it is going well" she nodded, dropping her eyes on Platform a word she had been struggling with.
"Her highness will be taken home soon" she wasn't happy about that, but Grayaeil looked at her as if she should.
She had no idea how Flamae was like, she didn't know what it even looked like- heck she didn't know it existed until a week ago.
And the Queen, her supposed mother, hadn't even spoken to her directly since the first night they met, she didn't even seem to want to see Nicoleta's face, Nicoleta seemed repulsive to her.
If she hated Nicoleta, Nicoleta didn't care because the feeling was very much mutual.
She remembered when her father would always try to sugarcode her mother leaving, by trying to convince her that she died, but Nicoleta remembered when she left, when she placed her in the crib.
When she didn't return despite Nicoleta crying loudly for her to come back. She remembered everything and spared her father the knowledge of it by just pretending to believe him.
Now that he had faced the fate he was bestowing upon his ex wife to spare his daughter, Nicoleta's hatred for that woman increased even more.
She didn't know how they were supposed to be living together when there was so much heat between them.
Even the thought of her made Nicoleta angry.
She sighed, trying to focus on the words.
The Captain stared at her for a long moment, moving closer to his own discomfort to seat himself beside her.
"Is there anything you are struggling with, your highness?" She shook her head.
"What is Flamae like?"
"It is beautiful. Flamae has three suns and two moons. Four nations and six private Isles- it is called the planet of flame amongst Martians" he paused, and corrected Nicoleta's spelling of Tegnes.
"Each nation has a form of nobility, but the west is the route of all their existence. The People's republic of Parinah has a Duke, he is head over the force, and he serves similar to a president- though on Flamae he is known generally as an overseer for the Queen, so does every Duke and Duchess."
"Crimsonians are deep routed in culture mostly, we operate based off of tradition, and culture unlike some other planet beings- " Nicoleta closed the note book after another correction, "be honest Grayaeil-"
"Every civilization has flaws, but which is better to focus on the bad or the good?" She shrugged, "the bad? To fix it so there's none?" She placed the book down, and wrapped her arms around her legs, leaning her head on her knees.
"What is Flamae really like?" The Captain sighed, "Flamae is a planet of beings that believe they are better than everyone and everything, we have established ourselves to be superior- " Nicoleta laughed at the ridiculousness of it.
"Then why didn't 'her majesty' stay on her planet then? Why did she come here to have me?"
"Tell me more," she said, calming herself down.
Over the month Nicoleta learned Wovis, and anything there was to know about Flamae, Grayaeil stayed strictly on teaching her the ridiculous things only, for example he told her there was a law in the east that forbade poor people from working- just to keep the wealthy abode of the nation strong.
They also prevented poor people from coming to their nation. Nicoleta understood their obsession with being rich when the Captain told her the nation's name.
"The Wealthy Account Of The People Of Niven" she laughed.
The Captain over thirty days could have conversations with Nicoleta in Wovis, though she stumbled over plenty of words, she showed herself to be a quick learner, picking up the words in record time after getting used to the basics.
"Woven is the head, every other nation is a part of the pipeline that traces back to the Queen- the North has a Duke"
She also learned that politics is how they ate, breathed, and drank on Flamae.
"A duchess and a Duke reign over the Niven people in the east, and the land of the Phoenix- which is the south, the republic of Stala have only a Duchess whether or not she gets mated she will be the sole ruler in the house of Stala"
She also learned that she hated politics.
"There was a king that despised his brother, and so he made him go to the north, and kill the Duke so he could become the Duke in place of him, he did so to avoid seeing his brother's face- he ended up seeing him more afterward, which permitted him to murder his brother soon after he had his first son"
She wasn't even sure if half of what she hated was political but she hated it regardless.
Why go through all the trouble to get rid of someone just to end up killing them? What was the point of letting the first Duke suffer?
At the end of March she had absorbed so much information about the planet and Wovis, that Nicoleta believed there was a time when she once lived there, and didn't remember.
The Captain encouraged her to take a break on the last day of March, not showing up at all so she would get her much deserved break, but she studied on her own.
After a lesson on the first of April, Nicoleta climbed on the window seal, and brought her knees to her chest, wrapping her arms around her legs, and resting her head between her knees.
Her gaze lingered on the beautiful sight outside, the nice blend of the palm trees, the pond, just the way the small courtyard had been organized, it deserved to be on paper.
Too embarrassed to ask for actual shading pencils, Nicoleta brought her note book and pen to her with her telekinesis.
Flipping it over to an empty page, Nicoleta began shading as best she could with the pen, glancing back and forth before making a precise stroke on the paper.
Half an hour through she had managed to capture the court yard in a scrappy sketch on the paper and wasted most of the ink.
The door opened and inside walked the Captain, "her majesty has ordered for you to be taken out doors your highness" he said. Nicoleta didn't protest once as she jumped off of her window seal, placed her hand between his gigantic arms, and let him and Leonardo lead her outside.
She inhaled a long heavy breath when they stepped outside, allowing the soft lukewarm breeze to touch her skin, as she basked in the freedom. For a whole month she ate in her room, studied in her room, and lived in her room.
Being able to be close to the rose bushes and the palm trees was a dream come true, she wandered the empty courtyard, brushing her hands through the rose bushes and plucking out one to smell.
Leonardo and the captain left her to her own business, seating themselves on the bench, as she wandered off towards the pond, note book held tightly to her chest.
Nicoleta looked up at the sky as a bird flew by, not stopping her walk as she did. Her foot was stung by a pebble and she brought it up instinctively, not checking her footing on her right leg as she did, causing her to trip and fall towards the pond.
Someone caught her and spun her over to balance.
It was Leonardo. He looked down at her with a crooked smile on his face, "you should be more careful" he said letting her go.
Nicoleta thanked him under her breath, "come on" he said, flicking her arm lightly to follow him. They returned to the benches, where Nicoleta settled down, and began sketching with the pen again.
She sketched the trees, the rose bushes, and the benches, then the captain who upon proper inspection wasn't so scary looking.
He had bronze coloured eyes, which seemed to constantly be filled with sorrow, his hair was the same colour, and his skin a couple shades darker with some blue mixed in.
She watched him as he turned his gaze to the palm trees, looking around the court yard with unfamiliarity, her hands sketched him unconsciously, capturing every small detail, from the line that defined his jaw, to the muscles that were flexed on his neck
His gaze landed on her, his eyes stern, as if he knew she was sketching him the captain glanced down on the notebook.
Leonardo chuckled from beside her, making her cover the sketch, "you didn't see anything- " she rapped out, he pursed his lips, "of course not"
She narrowed her eyes on him, before returning to her very obvious sketch of the captain, that she suspected even the man on the paper knew about.
She sketched until the pen ran out of ink, then asked nicely to be taken inside to which the captain answered, "as you wish your highness" as he always did, and held an arm out for her.
Before she went inside Leonardo terrorized her even more, "your sketch is lovely" Nicoleta embarrassed and fluttered, blushed, and shut her door, sinking to the floor, as she hit her forehead with the notebook twice.
Nicoleta had dinner inside her room as always, skipped her evening lessons, and sketched the pond with a new pen.
Afterward, she sat by her desk, and traced the pen in the paper letting nothing but memory guide her as her hand drew patterns on the paper.
A face began to show, one she knew. Nicoleta didn't stop herself, she continued the drawing, finishing his lips, and those warm brown eyes she would never get to see again.
Her eyes welled up with tears when she placed the pen down, done with the drawing of Ambrose Ariti, with his small smile, his hair messy.
A tear fell on his cheek, and slid down the paper making it seem as if he was crying with her.
She broke into tears, falling on her arms as her entire body shook.
Ambrose Ariti was gone, he was no more, she would never get to hug him, never get to kiss him, never get to look into his brown eyes, never get to share her art with her biggest fan.
She held his cold hands, saw his corpse, laid her head on his chest and heard nothing, brought her finger to his nose and felt no air, she held his hand, wrapped him in her white flame.
She knew he was dead. But it hurt so much more the second time, when she realised there wasn't a chance of seeing him again.
Indeed she had lost him, and he would never be in her life again.