The night turned into an enjoyable occasion for the students, despite the hiccup involving the Matron, everything else wound up being okay. The curfew had been lifted due to the dance that extended late into the night, but most of the students decided to call it a night after several hours. 

Kida, Arnora, T’laq, Alfric, G’raha and Azlyn found themselves sitting in a circle outside under the towering canopy tree. It was about three hundred yards away from the main event. Kida had prepared a blanket to lay on the grass for them to sit and chat. Lying the the center of their circle had been a stock pile of food they kindly apprised from the kitchen.

“Here’s a toast to our last free night, for war is coming and we won’t know what the future shall hold!” Kida raised a hand up with her glass. 

T’laq raised his own cup, “For the future of Sharlayan.”

Arnora and Alfric followed the two with their own glasses. “To our loved ones both near and far.”

Azlyn lifted up her glass, along with her childhood friend.

“To discovering another means of peace for the realm.” G’raha said.

“To rekindle the hope that many of our countries have lost.” Azlyn replied, thinking of the imperial rule over Doma. 

“Cheers!” They tapped their cups against one another and drank the liquid within. There was no alcohol, but the apple cider they found tasted fairly good. 

“So who knows how to fight! While the academy thinks poorly on fighting, I think it’s a necessary part of life.” Kida looked at each of them in the group. “I, for one, am pretty handy with a bow and a quiver of arrows!”

Arnora shook her head, “I only know how to heal light wounds, if anything I’m more of a discipline of the land.”

Alfric agreed. “Same, I’m a leather and armorer worker. Our family is known for our goods.”

T’laq reached over to G’raha to squeeze the muscles in his arm. “You must be a fighter, look at your muscle mass!” To which the other Miqo’te pulled his arm back.

“I’m versatile. I learned how to wield a sword, bow and arrow, and can heal when necessary. Azlyn’s another story.” He directed the whole groups attention back on her. 

“Oohhh?” Kida was intrigued. She leaned in wanting to know more.

Azlyn clasped her hands neatly in her lap, her tail was curled by her left side. “I learned all the different basic forms of martial and ranged styles. From physical melee and ranged, to magic as well.”

“So you can literally pick up any weapon?” T’laq sat dumbfounded. 

Arnora and Alfric gave her a similar look. 

“I just need a couple tries with it, but I’m a pretty fast learner.” Azlyn waved off their amazement with her hands. G’raha meanwhile leaned back on his hands. 

“She’s the epitome of a true genius—and her research isn’t all that bad either. She’s a rare one.”

Kida gazed with pure fascination. “I’ll say! What’s stopping you from just jumping ship and traveling the world?! You could be a first class adventurer!” She beamed with enthusiasm. 

Azlyn smiled warmly. “I just want to help out my parents and the Students of Baldesion.”

T’laq widened his eyes. “Yo, isn’t that the same group you’re with G’raha Tia?”

The Miqo’te nodded to answer. “Yeah, any scholar worth their weight would love to be apart of the order. I’ve been living with the orphanage for quite sometime now. I just want to learn as much as I can.”

Azlyn looked to her friend, also wondering what he wanted to do. He never really spoke of his future goals. 

“There’s much I want to learn about my ancestry. There’s just way too many unknowns, so hopefully my work with the Students of Baldesion pays off somehow.” He smiled and looked to T’laq. “Don’t think we forgot about you T’laq. What are you even good for?”

The other Miqo’te jumped. Scratching his head, he looked up with a dreamy face. “One day, I hope to become a Nunh and have an entire harem of pretty Miqo’te girls. Ahh—the life.”

Kida scrunched her face. “What are you, a freaking cat in heat? How many Miqo’te women are in this harem of yours?”

“About two hundred?” He offered, to which all the girls in the group narrowed their eyes on him. Alfric laughed, while G’raha shook his head. Cultures were still cultures. 

“Isn’t that a bit much?” Kida replied.

Arnora shook her head. “Hope you like drama, cause that sounds like a lot of drama.”

Azlyn fiddled with her fingers wondering why racial cultures were weird. A Miqo’te male always had “Tia” at the end of their name, until they either created an entire new community to become a Nunh, or fight a previous Nunh and take their title by force. All in all, it sounded like a rough tradition. 

T’laq looked to G’raha for support. “Come on, from one Miqo’te to another, it’s way safer just to gather a bunch of girls! Don’t you want to become a Nunh?”

G’raha felt the eyes back on him as he shrugged. “Not really? I don’t really care since I’m neck deep in research.”

T’laq looked devastated, “This is about our continuation of our race! And you’d rather study?!”

G’raha shrugged, turning to look at Azlyn. 

Arnora chuckled, “Looks like it’s up to you T’laq. Best of luck in your endeavors!”

T’laq didn’t back down, eying his brethren with beady eyes. “You’d rather be alone, wasting away the best part of your youth to study?!” His emphasis on the study was apparent as his voice went up an octave. 

Kida finally intervened, “To each their own! Besides, I think pretty boy’s got it all figured out.” She smiled, looking at the whole group. She didn’t miss how the he was staring at her new friend.

Azlyn yawned suddenly, the night was starting to drain on her, especially due to her lack of sleep. A wave of sleepiness rushed over her, her head started to bob. G’raha ignored Kida’s stare, leaned closer to the tired girl and waited for her to inevitably pass out. Like clockwork, she dropped her head to her right side where it found a spot to rest on his shoulder. 

“Something tells me he’ll be fine.”

G’raha snapped his attention up to stare at Kida, and decided it was best to avoid eye contact. She was reading him like a book. He looked up to see the clouds slowly drifting up, covering the moon. 

Arnora and Alfric pulled themselves up from the blanket to stretch. “Azlyn has the right idea, let’s call it a night. I think tomorrow is going to be a doozy of a day.”

Kida nodded, grabbing her bag forward to stuff all of their remaining food away. T’laq gave them a smirk before he said: “I’m heading back to the dance hall and play to my hearts content! Ya’ll are party poopers!” He bounced as quickly as he could. 

G’raha stared back at his friend before deciding it best to let her sleep. He brought an arm around her to pull her into a carrying hold. He was careful of her formal dress, as he pulled himself off the ground. Kida grabbed the excess fabric, draping it into her lap as he carried her in front of him.

“Do you want some help G’raha?” Alfric offered.

The teenager shook his head, “Its good, I’m used to this. She fell asleep a lot like this back home. This is normal.”

Kida smirked. “We don’t have a dorm matron anymore so you don’t need to sneak in.” She suggested deviously. “Or out for that manner.”

“Shut it.” He replied darkly. Arnora chuckled. 

Alfric beckoned his sister to follow along. He was already making his way back to her dorm. “I’m tired, catch you all later.”

Kida waved, Arnora waved back. 

G’raha nodded his head to the siblings leaving. Before he started his way back to the girl’s dorm Kida called out to him. “Hey pussy cat! Be careful with her!”

He looked over his shoulder with an exasperated look. “She’s not that fragile.” Then he started walking back to the dorms. 

Kida shook her head, cleaning up the remaining mess. “I wasn’t talking about her doofus.” She hummed a little tune and decided to call it a night—after a few more dances. 

G’raha sighed, following the path of lights down before he noticed a crowd of people surrounding the entrance to the dorms. Despite not having a dorm matron, the teachers became a bit stricter at the dorm. Which meant walking in was not an option. He knew her room was located on the third floor, which was easy enough for him to get into. Holding someone as he jumped—that would be a bit more difficult.

And with what happened with the girls ruining her dress, he didn’t want to risk passing his friend over to a random group of females. 

He had to sneak around the side, using the foliage as cover and waited for some of the patrols to go down. It wasn’t like back home where he could just take her home—he remembered her dad would give him some treats after tucking her away in bed. Her mom would ruffle his hair and ears for taking good care of her— those memories resonated strongly within him, as her family and the scholars on the Isle of Val had become an irreplaceable part of his life. 

He looked down at the slumbering girl in his arms. “When did you become someone you can’t take your eyes off of.” He wondered aloud, and shook his head. He had to strategically get her in her room and get out before getting caught. 

By the time he got to her buildings side, he found that her window had been left ajar. She was probably one of the few who did that. She probably did it out of habit then anything else. 

He reaffirmed a good hold on her, and jumped up on the closest wall. He quickly walked the narrow walkway on top of the brick, to a tree nearest the building. He jumped into the tree, gracefully landing on a thick branch, looking down. The window was closer now, and all he would need to do is leap to catch the windowsill. Of course that also meant changing how he carried her. He slung her over his shoulder, hoping she wouldn’t wake up from all the jostling, and finally jumped the last section with ease. He hung on the sill, and quickly used his other hand to open the glass. It pushed open with ease. 

G’raha pulled himself into her room. He could see where she worked around the mannequin, and bits of fabric were scattered around. There were several bags of brownies on the desk, with her paper she used to write her letters. He walked her over to her bed, laying her down and sat on the floor. He twirled a finger through a loose curl from her hair and sighed. 

“Is it bad I don’t want this night to end.” He wondered aloud, and pulled himself up from the floor. He was about to step up into the window to make his escape when he heard a noise. He stopped in his tracks. He looked over his shoulder, to see Azlyn sleepily pull herself up from the bed. She wiped her eyes as she adjusted to the dark. 

“Raha?”

He smiled, his one foot still standing on her ledge. “Oh so now you wake up.”

She chuckled. “Does that mean the dance is over?” A soft breeze blew in from outside, and with it a echo of a playing orchestra. 

G’raha shook his head. “It’s still going—wait don’t tell me I carried you all this way just so you could go back!” He almost looked like he was about to groan at the wasted effort. “You passed out—your eyes are bloodshot—don’t even think about going.”

Azlyn went to kick her heels off. They clattered to the floor as she stretched her arms up. “I won’t.” When he gave her a look of not believing her, she waved her hands in front. “No, I promise!”

She studied him standing in the window, the moonlight adding to his complexion. “Good.” He replied. 

“Hey, Raha?” She got up from her bed, remembering about the brownies she pulled aside for him. “I have someth—“ Her words cut off as her foot tripped on the length of her dress, she wasn’t clumsy by any means, but she was still pretty tired. 

What should have been a painful crash into her floor, turned into nothing. She was caught with ease as she was pulled up by G’raha. He gave her a concerned look. “What are you doing?”

She steadied herself by grabbing his arms. “Lost my balance, I guess.” She joked, and gestured with a nod to her desk. “I grabbed a brownie set for you. Take one.”

When he was sure she wasn’t going to fall, he walked over to her desk to grab a bag. He smiled at the treat, and then chuckled. “Guess there was no need to be jealous after all.” 

“Huh?” Azlyn wondered.

“Nothing,” He opened the bag, grabbing the chocolate dessert with a smirk. “Ejika is going to get so mad.”

Azlyn shook her head, “Don’t tease him too much.”

He started to eat a bit of the treat, taking a moment to sit down on the edge of the sill. “These are pretty good—did you make them?”

“No, Kida did. I was cleaning up.” Which reminded her that she hadn’t cleaned as well as she thought she did. 

“It’s pretty tasty, did you have one?” 

Azlyn shook her head, already busying herself with cleaning the scraps she missed. G’raha pulled a piece off the brownie and held it out for her. 

“Here, take a bite.”

She blinked, and then walked over to him to eat the tiny bit from his hand. He didn’t expect her to literally eat from his hand as she bit into the chocolate treat. 

“It is pretty delicious!” Smiling, she happily enjoyed it. He merely pulled another bite off from it and held it out for her once again. She ate that too without reserve, and he gave her a lopsided grin. He sat fully down on the ground, deciding he wouldn’t leave quite yet. 

“Think we’re going to be busy after this?” He asked her, taking a bite from the brownie this time. It wasn’t long before she was sitting in front of him, where he propped one of his knees up for her to lean forward on. He had his back against the wall, tail lightly thumping against the wood of her floor. 

“Mom said her and dad were going to Eorzea to help set up prayer stones. I’m not sure what that entails, but yeah, I think we’ll get busy.”

“I heard the Archon talking about other adventurers helping out too. I guess they were blessed by the echo, like Krile is.”

Azlyn blinked in rapid succession. “Really? What are they doing exactly?”

G’raha shrugged, before he offered her a bite from his brownie again. She willingly took it as he answered. “Well Archon Baldesion said in his last letter that they’re doing oddball jobs around Eorzea, handling the beast tribes, and holding the garleans back. 

“Sounds like a tough job.” Azlyn wondered if she’d wind up like them too. She thought back to her visions and strange powers of seeing past events. 

“He calls them Warriors of Light. It’s an interesting name, but unfortunately there isn’t a lot of them. Who knows, maybe with their help, we’ll be able to end the war.”

Azlyn nodded, “I hope so too.” And proceeded to eat a huge chunk off from the brownie in his outstretched hand. Surprised by that, he yanked back what remained of the brownie. 

“I thought we had an arrangement!”

“But I’m hungry!” She countered, to which he sighed.

 “Betrayed by my best friend!” But he offered her the last bit of the treat. They were joking around as they typically did. And he smiled. A few hours had flown by with them just chatting away. As the moon started to disappear under the cover of the clouds. G’raha rolled his neck and cracked his knuckles. 

“Hey Raha?” Azlyn said, leaning up on his propped knee. “Sing me one of your songs.”

He wiped his hands from the crumbs. He looked to her, “Any song?”

She nodded. G’raha leaned his head back against the wall as he thought to himself. “Alright, but afterwards I have to make like a tree and leaf.”

Azlyn chuckled, “Then I want the longer version.” She started to tease him, and so he reached out to ruffle her hair. She tried to avoid his grasping hands, but couldn’t completely avoid him. 

“You’re going to sleep after the third verse.” He complained.

“You’ll just put me to bed afterward like you always do.” She instantly retorted. 

G’raha reached to her, bringing her close to him as he started to sing in her ear. She relaxed in his embrace as he weaved a tale from his tribe long ago. She nestled her head inside the nook of his shoulder and neck, closing her eyes to listen to his soft voice dance in the air. Even singing acapella, he had a beautiful sound.