#8point5rozarriaspride

Dear Sir Margrace,

…

Dear Al-Cid Margrace,

Dear Al-Cid,

I find myself wondering where you are as of now. Your passion carries you far, I am sure

Dear Margrace,

Has your family received my request well? I hope you will reply with a detailed account.

I recall how terribly fond you are of my garden. I spent a lovely afternoon by the libernum, and wished you might enjoy the blooms with me.

Angels keep you well.

Heliconia: Do you like when it rains?

"Yes. Immeasurably. I enjoy it a tad too much, many a chill has been caught because of it."

Aster: Would you rather be cold or hot?

"Cold - for you can always put layers on, but there are only so many layers a man may take off before he is indecent."

Allium: What’s the best thing you can cook?

"Busy, and yet dull, without our leading man."

"As well it should be," He smirked, eyes fond. "Though I am not the only one that has made my presence these days scarce - do foreign beauties take you from us? Or more mundane things?"

She turned her face back toward the castle interior, to the halls within. If they had been spotted in their flight, there would soon be monsters on the heels of the prince and she; and yet the alternative seemed far worse, to think that within, all of her citizens, all the castle residents were still in danger of falling to that vampire horde, or to the vampire that spawned them all. She could not fight them herself. Yet...

"I cannot allow my people to suffer it all within, if I may help it..." she spoke quietly. "If I might draw at least some of the fighting here..." As she looked back to Al-Cid, she sensed that he understood already. 

"... I am sorry. Though you may run now, if you wish; you've already done me a great service in seeing me this far. Deep within the garden, if you run now, you will be safest. I will call them to me."

...

It was with some dismay that she saw he had no intention of going, and yet there was also much admiration. She feared for him, and yet- well, it would be a brazen lie to say she was not afraid for herself.

"At the least, if you stay-- do protect your ears. They are better suited to more delicate things." The queen drew in a breath.

In the voice that once call out to a legion, that cried over smashing bodies and clashing steel, Hilda bid, "Seek you the Queen of Fynn? Come, then!"