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A young girl with fiery red hair cackles gleefully at her terrified brother’s expression as she flops down cross-legged at the foot of his bed, meeting his growing glare with a wide grin.
“Thou’rt pitiful, Radahn. One might think thee half thy age.”
Too delighted with herself to initially realize the ramifications of her actions, her expression suddenly becomes a touch more stern as she presses a finger to her lips and gives him an indignant shush. “Thee and thine screaming art certain to rouse Iji. Mother hath told thee twice afore this week not to wake him.” Her stern expression cracks once or twice with a self-satisfied giggle.
Radahn glowers, clutching the blanket he’d attempted to hide behind tighter, still not quite able to peel himself from the wall he’d plastered himself against in shock. “I cannot help that thou’rt a terror!” he spits in an exasperated half-whisper. “Mother wouldn’t be teaching thee such spells if she knew thy designs were to use them for tormenting me so.” He continues, struggling desperately to disguise the tremble in his voice. “And Iji as well!”
Ranni’s eyes twinkle mischievously as her smile becomes a smirk.
“Our mother did not teach me that spell.” She explains proudly without explaining anything. Her brother’s frown intensifies.
“Who then?” He asks, desperate to know where to direct his frustration, even as the act of trying to figure out who it might have been begins to draw him out of his tense, bunched-up state. “Not Iji. He knows how mother feels about Sellian magic. He would never hear the end of it from her if she caught word.”
His younger sister’s smirk remains intact as she shakes her head excitedly, enjoying that she’s successfully made a guessing game of her accomplishment.
“No, not Iji.” She supplies, eager for Radahn to remain engaged. He crosses his arms in thought, finally letting go of his blanket as he ponders. The next idea to come to his mind wrinkles his nose.
“Seluvis?” He asks incredulously and somewhat hopeful to be wrong. “Father would feed him to the hounds if he found out thy preceptor was teaching thee spells against mother’s wishes.”
Ranni giggles excitedly as she shakes her head yet again.
“No, Seluvis did not teach me either. Although the spell did come from his study.”
“From his study?” Radahn repeats, brows furrowed quizzically for a moment before his eyes snap open in recognition and he sits forward. “Ranni!! Didst thou steal that spell?!”
Ranni does her best to shush him again through her delighted laughter.
“I will not be shushed!” Radahn insists, giving her a playful shove. “Answer me!”
Suddenly, another voice speaks up from beside the bed: “You aren’t going to get her in trouble, are you?”
Radahn shrieks a second time, flattening himself against the wall and as far from the voice as he can muster before recognizing the tell-tale eyeshine of his half-brother.
“Blaidd, I swear!! Do not sneak up on me like that!!”
Radahn hisses over the laughter of his sister, who is now far too entertained to bother shushing him. “And Ranni!” He continues, exasperated, as he gives her another shove. “Do not lecture me about rousing Iji if thou’rt going to be so careless! Hush! Thou hardly need me to get thee in trouble!”
Blaidd’s ears lower as Radahn gives Ranni the shove and a tiny growl escapes him, lips curling ever so slightly. His sister seems to notice immediately and shoves Radahn back away from her with her leg.
“Oh Blaidd, I am fine. Radahn could not hurt me if he tried.” She explains proudly, much to her brother’s chagrin. “And I hardly see how I will get in trouble now that I can vanish as I please. I shall return the scroll before the old rat ever notices its absence.” Radahn rubs his arm where the kick connected sulkily as Ranni pats a spot on the bed next to her for Blaidd.
“Oh, no.” He protests, quickly scrambling for a bedraggled stuffed horse and pulling it close. “Blaidd is not allowed up here until he promises to stop chewing mine things!”
“He does not mean anything by it, Radahn.” Ranni sighs, rolling her eyes and patting the bed again defiantly. “Our father can fix your precious horse.”
Blaidd, completely ignoring Radahn’s protests, clambers up onto the bed next to his sister, ears still flattened. Radahn glowers at him and hugs the horse defensively. “Do not touch anything, Blaidd.”
The wolf-child immediately begins searching out something to touch out of spite but, finding nothing of note, just huffs indignantly.
“Anyhow,” Radahn continues, returning his attention to Ranni. “I presume thou hast reason for terrorizing me at this hour.”
Ranni grins from ear to ear and holds out a hand expectantly toward Blaidd who places in it a small object wrapped in cloth. Radahn eyes it warily. “Oh, didst thou hope to implicate me in thine trespass by delivering me a souvenir?”
“No, dullard!” She retorts, beginning to unwrap the cloth and bathing her face in the telltale green glow of glintstone. “My hope was that this would be of use to thee. Helpful, even.” The stone in question, cut and polished into a perfect sphere nearly the size of her head, was completely unlike the unrefined clumps of craggly blue rock children their age were expected to practice with. This one looked as though it were meant to be set into the scalp of a scholar’s crown and Radahn noticeably tenses as its eerie light floods the room.
“Oh sister, thou knowest I despise these.” He whines. “What didst thou seek to accomplish by bringing this to me? And at this hour? I fail to see the help or use in this at all.”
Ranni frowns.
“When I was young,” She begins, but is quickly interrupted by her brother’s annoyed voice.
“Thou art young yet.”
“When I was young,” she continues, rolling her eyes. “Our mother would have me sleep with Glintstone and walk amongst the stars in mine dreams.” She turns the stone in her hands, admiring the speckled cosmos within before returning her gaze to meet Radahn’s nervous expression. “And I thought it may help thee as it helped me. I do not fear the night as thou do, perhaps because I know it better.”