It scared her.
As she retreated to the safety of her quarters, her gaze was caught by the objects sitting on her bed: a fat sketchbook and pack of drawing pencils. She reached out and took them, surprised to find them there and even more surprised at how strongly she'd missed them. They were like old friends who came to visit after a long absence. She flipped open the notebook and buried her nose between the pages, breathing the fresh paper smell. She felt tears in her eyes at the small reminder of her past life and hugged the gifts to her chest.
A'Ran.
It couldn't be coincidence that he returned and they appeared! She forgot her shaky body and the whirling of her emotions and strode toward the door, intent on discovering if he had done this and if so, if he had more. Such a notebook would last her a week or two. Kiera stopped in the hallway, considering where the enigmatic dhjan might have gone.
She trotted down the hall, toward the practice fields, not surprised to see all the warriors sparring on the field. A'Ran was several hundred meters out, surrounded by a group of over a dozen. Ne'Rin was closer to the door, and Kiera remained in the shadows inside the house, watching.
He was sparring with another warrior, his fluid, destructive movements far from the gentle ones he used with her. She admired the way his body shifted and moved. The muscles of his upper body bulged as he sparred, their changing shapes amplified by a play of shade and sunlight.
She debated returning to her quarters until she could find a more private moment to approach him. She doubted he'd appreciate her embarrassing one of them. For once, she wished she'd listened to Gage or Talal.
Ne'Rin caught sight of her just as she decided to leave. The cool toss of his head-- a blatant dismissal-- changed her mind again. She shot him a look and stepped from the house, moving toward the field with the gifts at her side. She ignored him as she passed. Though he made no move to stop her once she was visible, he did trail her. Those who noticed her stopped to bow as she passed them.
She reached the circle where A'Ran fought and joined the observers. Some of the men were exotic even by Anshan standards. One towered just as tall as the other men but was thinner than any waif-like model she had seen on earth. Another was hunch-backed and dressed in heavy robes despite the heat of the day, and a third man barely taller than her had white irises and silvering hair.