[Orual]

Rie watched as Nuru sat down with her brother, then slipped away back upstairs. She closed the door quietly behind her. She didn't know why she bothered, there was no way that Talômi could hear her from downstairs. She laughed at herself. Even if he had heard, why would it matter? She could just see her brother bolting upright in his chair, with a knowing smile on his face: "Aha! That door slamming was my sister!"

Her grin slipped off of her face. She was always running. Always running. Maybe for once she should just go and face her fears.

But it was so much easier not to.

***

"Talômi, what makes you so anxious to find Rie?"

The young man ran his fingers through his red hair, and sighed. "Well, Miss--I don't think I caught your name." Way to stall, he thought.

"Nurumaiel Firithbor," the Elf said, unwilling to be deterred. Her patient blue gaze told him that if he took all night to answer her question, she'd sit and wait for it.

"As you know, Rie's my twin," he continued. He was struggling to find the right words. "Everything we did as children, we did together. I was like her bodyguard, only she did all the guarding. She was the stronger twin, with all the ideas and ambition and incentive. I was the one who kept her from killing herself. Maybe I wasn't as much fun as she, but I was like her shadow. She didn't go anywhere without me, and I wouldn't have known where to go without her, even if I wanted to do something without her.

"But I guess that it really changed when we turned eighteen. I'm sure she's told you about how all of us are Rangers." Nuru nodded, and Talômi found himself surprised by how much he was opening up to this Elf. He was not much of a talker, but from the way he was going on now no one could have told. "When I was eighteen, I was accepted as a Ranger. My training was complete. And I started to go with my father when he went away. I think that Rie really resented it. I mean, it was bad enough when Father and Talormé and Analai would leave her home, but now her own twin was leaving her.

"I don't think that she left to punish me for leaving her," Talômi said, but his voice was uncertain. "I think she just supposed that I had made my own life away from her, and it was her turn to leave. But she didn't understand. I didn't like being away from home without her any more than she liked staying home. So when I came home one day and she was gone, I was shattered. I didn't know why she had gone, but I knew that I was going to do the same thing that I always do: follow her.

"But I guess she didn't want to be followed," he laughed bitterly, and took a quick drink. Then he sighed. "But I guess you didn't need to hear all of that. You know Rie better than I do, but I'm guessing that she doesn't want to be found. A clean break and all. I don't want to reopen old wounds for her, but I miss her so much." Realizing how much he had said, he stopped short, and looked sheepishly into his mug.