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Luke / 5 / adventure / second 💜

Character: Luke Randolph

POV: 2nd person Genre: Adventure

Prompt #5: “Do you want to talk about it, or do you want a distraction from it?”

Wordcount: 998

A/N: Hiya Violet, thank you for the request! I was super duper close to turning this into Luke's Pokemon journey, but maybe we'll leave that for another day.

Sand immediately seeped into the tears in your pants as you collapsed onto your knees, coarse and grainy against raw flesh. You heaved breath after breath, clutching your searing chest with quivering fingers, as briney salt invaded your nostrils, the scent unfamiliar and painful.

You peeled the heavy pack off your sweaty back just as another figure collapsed beside you. Luke landed eagle-spread in the sand, green hood obscuring the top half of his stung, sunburned face, giving him the appearance of a sliced watermelon shriveling under the sun. 

You inhaled a final shaky breath and pulled the map out of your shirt. Several new creases had formed since you hastily stashed it away, but Rio’s markings still showed clearly. Verdant Jungle: fire ant, tic, bee infestation. Avoid green-bark trees. Salt water good for stings.

Something buzzed nearby and you swatted your neck. The smushed remains of a fuzzy black bee, and purple venom oozed down your fingers when you pulled back. Great, that made seven stings. That you knew of. Of course they wouldn’t be honey bees, you thought, shooting a contemptuous glare at the panting Luke. You hadn’t seen a single living flower in days. 

You absentmindedly flicked the carcass and scratched your neck as you studied the map again. Scribbled just below the jungle, right on the bottom edge of the paper, was a pair of the goofiest faces smiling up at you. Sapphire Shores: hideaway paradise. 

Your breath caught in your throat as you looked up. The sand extended a fair way ahead then stopped abruptly to be replaced by the largest slab of blue you’d ever seen. You knew it was water, of course the ocean was full of water, but the stillness of the air and the trees against the roaring waves turned the scene into a semi-living being. Like an unfinished painting and you had front row seats to each new brushstroke. 

Flecks of warm ocean spray hit your tingling cheek as you opened your pack. You produced the rose stalk, what was left of it anyway, and slipped off your boots. The sand scalded your blistered feet as you approached the water, but the moment you stepped in the glistening puddles, it was as though a silencing spell had fallen. Cool, slippery foam pushed and pulled between your toes, and though your exhausted body threatened to collapse into its depths, for the first time in a month you felt strangely balanced. At peace. In control.

You plucked the final scarlet petal, let it fall, and watched the waves drift it out to sea. A tiny crab scuttled along the shallowest part of the shore, and you trained your eyes on its precise movements as it expertly maneuvered around pebbles and shells. 

Leon would make a good king. He already had experience as a leader and the people really liked him. Plus he was sincere, earnest, and easy to talk to… a little too easy. But you couldn’t count Chevalier out. He could command a room just by entering, and his actions were based on decades of knowledge and calculations. He was dominating and honest… but perhaps too much so.

The crab encountered a cracked pink shell. It could easily pass around it, but for some reason it halted and stared, as though transfixed by the chipped swirling patterns. 

Any prince would be excellent. And it’s not like the ones who weren’t chosen would simply cease to exist; of course they’d remain and help their brother. That was something even young children could expect. Yet they still expected you to make that choice.

The crab remained in place. Farther out at sea, the rumbling of a new wave burbled.

One month was hardly enough time to learn about a person, let alone eight. And select from among them a king? They were asking the impossible from you. A miracle. It’s like they expected you to fail. It’s like they anticipated a fail safe.

Rushing water enveloped your view as the wave crashed, soaking you up to your waist. Your hair frizzed as airborne froth stuck it out unevenly, but you still managed to locate the poor crab, rocking and kicking its limbs madly in the air. You crouched and tipped the crab back onto its legs with the tip of your rose stalk. It hurriedly scampered off without a backward glance.

“Amazing,” whispered a voice. Luke now stood beside you, bare feet submerged, staring at the horizon.

“First time in the water?” you asked. It was at that moment you realized that though you spent the past month traveling together, this was the first question you asked of him. All the golden opportunities to know more about this competitor for the throne, and you wasted them insisting on this perilous journey south. Truly, Sariel made a mistake selecting you as Belle. 

Your mind drifted to Rio and how he slipped you the filled pack with the map and rose the very night you were brought to the palace, and how he insisted he stay behind for “damage control” despite your protests. You’d encountered Luke at the city gates with nothing more than a broadsword and his own pack. You thought of the nights spent in dubious inns where you were sure Luke barely slept a wink. You thought about how that wasn’t his most peculiar behavior; about the time he’d fallen off a stool when an old man in an eyepatch drunkenly collapsed on your breakfast, or how he’d somberly whisper names in the few instances he did sleep, like a sinner possessed. 

“No,” Luke replied, “I used to visit a lake with my mom and stepdad.”

“And Leyla?” you asked hesitantly, and Luke’s gaze sharpened on the sea. You watched the welts on his face throb as you swirled lazy circles in the water with your hands, feeling at last the pain starting to quell.

It was almost comical; two outcasts escaping the crown, hopping the border, surviving a perilous journey usually only accomplished by highly-trained adventurers, and yet you still struggled to look each other in the eye.

“Do you want to talk about it?” you started, cupping some water in your hands, “Or do you want a distraction from it?” You splashed Luke and took off deeper into the ocean. He shook his head and began to follow, only to trip and fall face-down into the water. He picked himself up, removed his coat, and tied the sleeves and ends to a spherical shape. Your hearty laughter turned to squeals of panic as he scooped water into his makeshift bowl, a triumphant grin spreading across his features.

The next few requests will be more light-hearted, don't you worry guys :)

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