Neverwinter Forest spitfire

A frown twisted the raven’s lips as he regarded the dreambringer with the bright eyes. “Don’t explore alone, Lucy,” he quietly commanded her, sheathing the clipped way his consonants betrayed his fear with a soft, entreating, “please?” The haunted smile that flitted across her waiflike features did little to soothe him. “You have to stay with Rannoch or me.” The “buddy system” had never been strictly enforced by Scimitar or Eshe, for their princes had been joined at the hip from a very young age. They were growing apart now as befit their burgeoning maturity, but Cypress could not trust Lucy to be as self sufficient as he believed he and Rannoch were. Cypress did not harbor the butterfly-like feelings of infatuation toward the girl that stirred Rannoch’s blood. He found her to be a fragile creature — a princess to be protected; an otherworldly creature to be tamed. If necessary, he would have no qualms in keeping her against her will; it was, he believed, his duty as her guardian.

Shifting awkwardly, feeling as though he’d been too brusque in his interaction with the girl, “We could explore together,” he suggested, willing to follow her lead or show her some of his favorite places in the forest. He would gladly have done whatever she wished. “Noch and I know this forest better than anyone,” he boasted, inflating their scouting skill without fully meaning to lie. He spoke with the simple pride of one born to this forest, ready to be the street rat who showed the princess a world she might never have dreamed of alone. “Every part of this forest has a story,” he told her ambitiously, which wasn’t precisely true. “I’ll tell you as many as you want to hear, Lu.” He wanted to please her; he was unsure of the how or the why — but all the other questions were easily answerable: here, now, Lucy, and Cypress.