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The mornings were the hardest. Over the last three weeks, Vangelis had been healing. For the last three days, he had been practising sitting up and finally reaching the point where he could stand. Now, he was walking. For the most part. With moments of unsteadiness and a gait that was awkward at best as one of his legs refused to work right, Vangelis had finally hobbled outside of his room for the first time yesterday. Now he was determined to make it all the way outside and smell some fresh air for the first time since he'd been crushed beneath what felt like half a mountain.
So far, he had managed - with the help of a slave girl - to dress, pull on his boots and fasten on his belts that supported a long knife down one hip and one of his dual swords. He left the other (which would normally strap across his chest and hang at his back, in the room. He only needed enough weaponry for a little light practice and self-defence if necessary.
Brushing his fingers through his hair as an answer to a comb, and then tying the now overlong (nearly a month in bed will do that to your locks) into a small tail at the back of his head, Vangelis stuck his hand into the basin he was supporting himself on and wiped the water that was now room temperature over his face.
Despite all the bumps and bruises that still seemed to coat him from head to foot, the crown prince of Kotas finally felt on his way to being human again.
Drying off his face on a provided piece of towelling - it felt good to be freshly shaved again, even if it did bring out the purple - Vangelis glanced around in time to notice a pair of eyes watching him from around the crack in the door. Normally, Vangelis had his chambers shut tight, never liking the idea of someone taking the open space as an invitation to enter without permission but, as he was intended on his way out, he hadn't corrected the serving maid who had left with her hands full and been unable to do more than draw the door to an ajar state.
With a curl to the cover of his lips, Vangelis dried his hands as he spoke.
"A prince does not sneak, Dion." He said with both disapproval and affection.
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Vangelis of KotasDion stopped short and then turned to stare at his uncle with a look of shock on his face. "I was not sneaking!" he told his uncle in indignation, his hands on his hips and a giant grin on his face. When he had been told that one of his favorite Uncles had been hurt, the resulting scene had resulted in a very upset and some said, angry princeling. Dion raged at the fact that the event had happened, not at the person that had done it. How dare they harm his uncle, his blood.
It was said that Dion felt things deeply and that his moods shifted in time with things that he felt around him. Moving farther into the room his eyes darted around and then came to land on Vang himself and he got a slow onceover that went from head to foot. "Do you need any help Uncle? What happened?" No one had told him what had happened, well not in enough detail that satisfied the young prince's need to know. His family was well versed in the contradiction that was Dion. The young man was very curious with a love of knowledge on top of his highly sensitive being. He knew of some herbs that could help his uncle along his path of healing, thanks to the lessons he learned when he was visiting his aunts with his mother. His uncle just needed to let him know.
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Vangelis raised an eyebrow at his nephew as he insisted that he wasn't sneaking despite the fact that he had preferred to peer around the door rather than walk through it. But Vangelis wasn't a man who handled trifles like that - his mother would correct anything on a more detailed level. The crown prince was more about the all-encompassing effect and intention.
When Dion asked what had happened to him, Vangelis considered the options for what to tell him. It was likely his parents had given him little detail of the injuries and the accident that occurred during the storm so as not to frighten the boy. But then, now that he was out of the woods health wise and healing up with appropriate (if even escalated) timeframe, perhaps it wouldn't be so scary to know the truth. Least not when he knew the ended of the story had his uncle standing perfectly fine in his quarters once more just a few weeks later... Then again, the kid didn't need all of the gruesome details.
"I was caught in the mines during the storm, Dion." He told his nephew, the kid having been kept in during the heavy winds and rain for his own safety would know exactly the storm he was referring to. "There was a rock slide and I was injured beneath it." He raised a finger at the boy. "Which is exactly why you're only permitted to go into the areas your father designates as safe to explore." Not that he suspected that would make much difference. Zanon and he had always explored mine shafts they were not permitted to. It was in a boy's nature to break boundaries.
"Where is your father, today?" He asked the boy, making casual conversation as he threw aside the drying cloth and headed towards his nephew and the door. His gait was a little odd, placing weight more heavily on his good leg. But he was determined not to hop or use a crutch. His injured limbs needed reminding of how to operate and hold his weight...
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Vangelis of Kotas Dion watched his uncle still grinning. He saw his brow shift upwards and brushed it off like many children his age had a habit of doing mostly because they had no clue what the gesture meant he moved closer to Vangelis during the quiet that slowly filled the room. He was curious. All his parents had told him was that his unca had been hurt and needed to heal. He said prayers daily hoping that the gods would heal him and quickly. His dark gaze trained itself on his uncle’s face as he listened to his explanation. Upon hearing that he was stuck in the mines during the big storm, Dion’s eyes grew to saucers. Dion shivered as he remembered all the wind and the rain and not being able to go outside to play. He raged and ranted over being stuck inside. Dion tilted his head and blinked at his unca. The image of rocks falling and hurting him made him angry at the idea and his face showed the scowl that came as a result. He blinked at the idea of his father telling him no. He raspberried his unca in response and watched him move towards him. When Vangelis moved towards him, his small hand reached out to help him. In reply to his question he said simply. “Dunno.”
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Vangelis watched as his nephew behaved... well... like a child. The problem was, at nearly twelve years old, the boy was almost not one. Soon, he would be expected to behave with propriety and decorum befitting his role and station in the kingdom. Silly noises and a face that offered an expressive outlet for every thought in his head would be detrimental to his future in either politics or military affairs.
""You don't know."" Vangelis corrected the boy with a hard tone as he allowed Dion to take him by the hand. His nephew was small and a little weedy, with the same build he himself had had at his age before war and battles had added muscle to the frame, but without the same sort of height the Kotas blood normally engendered in their male offspring. Instead, Dion was just small. His hair was curly and his front teeth a little too large for his face. For all intents and purposes, he very much looked like a child. And perhaps for the others in the Kotas manor, it was clear that that was what he was when they lived within him day in and day out and didn't necessarily notice the passing of years. Vangelis, on the other hand, however, was a ship in the night and would return to Colchis, to Midas and to his home on an irregular enough basis that he was able to be more objective in his assessment of the boy. The boy who was soon to be a man.
"You are not long off of adulthood, Dion, which means you need to be speaking correctly." He told the boy as he encouraged him to lead them out of Vangelis' rooms and down the corridor beyond, headed for the outdoors. Vangelis wasn't amazingly steady upright but so long as he kept his weight off of his right leg and attempted to hop rather than step most of the way there, he was able to make the journey without relying too much of his mass upon Dion's shoulders. He glanced at the boy with a hard flash of his eyes.
"And if I hear you make that childish noise again, I will seal your lips together with honey and paste." It was the same threat he had heard his own father use upon Silas when he was small.
By this time, they had managed to reach the outer courtyard of the Kotas manor and Vangelis was breathing heavily but not so much as to alarm his nephew, holding back the majority of the difficulty his injuries were causing him.
"Now... go and fetch your practice sword." He told the kid with a nod towards the stables where he knew they were kept for just such times. "We'll work on your stances and strikes..."
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