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It was supposed to be a small lesson in white magic. How could it fail so horribly? Dimitri was in utter disbelief as a huge dust cloud emerged out of nowhere after he tried to replicate what Marianne had just taught him.
Worried over what might have happened to her he called out for her, "Marianne? Marianne, are you alright please say something!"
No response, his heart froze in panic and fear, while the Adrenalin almost settled in, as he prepared himself to run as fast as possible to seek out Mercedes.
However a small but high voice answered his calls, "Hello, I´m here!"
He turned around, the cloud finally disappearing and with it revealing a small girl with bright blue hair that waved her little hand at his direction. Rushing over to her side, Dimitri checked in on her, "Are you hurt?! How did you get here? Have you seen a girl with your same hair color? Her name is Marianne, she was just here a moment ago!"
"My name is Marianne, sir." The tiny girl replied, giving him a confused stare that was soon replaced by her curiously observing her surroundings.
"But Marianne is around my age, sweetie. Maybe you share the same name as her?" Dimitri had to admit they looked quite similar, although this Marianne seemed to be more open around strangers than the one he loved to spend time with. Worry still plagued his mind, Marianne was nowhere to be found. It would have been one unforgivable thing to find her injured, yet she was missing and now he had to deal with this small child and find out how it even got here all of the sudden,
Neigghhhh, his train of thought got interrupted when one of the horses at the stables caused chaos that could be heard from inside.
"Are we near a stable?" The tiny Marianne asked with sparkling eyes that looked like they had found a treasure.
"Yes, it´s just around the corner. I cloud—"
"Please, show me the way!"
He couldn´t help but laugh at the enthusiasm of the girl, who just so happened to interrupt his offer to guide her there. "Alright, alright! I´ll bring you there, but then I have to leave you with somebody else so I can get back and search for my friend. Do you agree to these terms?" He held his pinky finger up towards her direction and she shyly grabbed it with her own.
The staff at the stable looked at him weirdly when he arrived with the small Marianne behind his back, who was hiding from the glances. They didn´t ask too many questions though and just let them pass. Marianne looked around fascinated by the sheer number of horses, pegasi and even wyverns the monastery kept.
"Do they all have names, mister?" She asked, with the resolve in her eyes that almost made him believe that she was going to learn and get to know each animal on a deep personal level.
"To be quite frank most of their partners are too afraid to give them names." Marianne stared at him like he was speaking in a different language, but he couldn´t blame her. She was probably too young to really grasp the graveness of death. Dimitri had to come up with something to avoid confronting that topic, that was when Marianne waddled over to a horse who was a little bit fidgety.
"Does he have a name, sir? Can I pet him, please? He says, that he´s scarred. We need to help him!" When Dimitri looked at which horse she was pointing at he was a bit surprised over the coincidence. It was Dorte, Marianne´s horse, she was curious about.
The similarities just kept adding up and Dimitri didn´t want to believe it, but when he witnessed how tenderly this girl stroked Dorte´s fur, whilst soothing him by talking to him and how quickly Dorte calmed down, he had to admit it. This girl was his Marianne, yet somehow she turned at least a decade younger.