Contest: Naesala x Leanne

                                               Devilish Angel

She was easy to spot at the camp, the utterly pristine figure surrounded by all of those warriors dirtied from battle. Her hair radiant, her clothes white, her entire aura more pure than he had ever been, even at birth. That would not deceive him, though, for after all of the years he had known her and even after all of their years apart, he knew that there was a seldom seen devilish side to Leanne. It was Naesala’s favourite thing about her—and though he hardly wanted to discourage his favourite part of Leanne, it had begun to be a very troublesome thing in the setting of warfare.

“Leanne, my dear,” Naesala said as he swooped his arm about her waist, his right wing neatly fitting over her left one. She looked up at him with a smile, though he did not look back at her yet, instead telling her casually, “Let’s go for a walk.” He guided her forward a step at a time, their paces differing and forcing them to move slowly until they could get their footfalls matched. Only when they were a far enough distance away that the laguz ears, most of them at least, would not pick up on their words did Naesala stop and face Leanne. He leaned forward a little and rested his hand on her shoulder as he admitted, “I have a motive for walking with you like this.”

Leanne’s eyebrows dove toward the bridge of her nose, though her smile was still the same one that had greeted Naesala. “Naesala, you’re so sneaky!” she chided light-heartedly in ancient words.

The smile that he returned was wry; the tone of his voice matched it completely. “Funny that you should say that. I was about to make an identical remark about you.” Leanne’s eyebrows lifted, her eyes opened as large as they could get. The picture of innocence, illustrated by a little devil. “In that battle that we were in today I saw an awful lot of you.”

“Is that bad?” Leanne asked, her lower lip jutting out slightly into a pout.

He moved his hand from her shoulder to her face, stroking it once and then using his thumb to stretch the corner of her pouted mouth into a forced half-smile. Leanne swatted his hand away, though the forced half-smile became a willing full-smile as she did so. “Not the seeing you. Only that the fact that I was seeing you means that you were in the frontlines, which I don’t think is a good place for herons,” he answered.

“I was protecting you!”

“Really?” Naesala’s eyes widened just slightly with intrigue, though a light chuckle at the end of his ‘really?’ gave away his scepticism. “Tell me how you planned on protecting me. I’m curious.”

Leanne stuck her nose up at him upon recognizing his challenge. “Easy!” she declared. “They would run up to you, waving their weapons around going, ‘Yaaargh, we’re going to kill you!’. That’s when I would say, ‘No you aren’t, you’re so funny!’ and then fly down,” at this, Leanne flapped her wings to indicate the action and then gripped onto both of Naesala’s shoulders, “and grab them and lift them away from you!” Instead of actually doing this to Naesala, she let go and stood back with triumph.

His smirk contested her confidence. “Very tempting, Leanne. But tell me—who will protect you while you’re protecting me?” Leanne simply poked a finger at his chest in response. “So then wouldn’t it make more sense for Naesala to protect Naesala in the frontlines while Leanne protects Leanne at the back?”

“That’s silly. Then we wouldn’t be together.” Her voice was oozing naivety, but he knew it was another work of her devilish side. Instead of saying anything to contradict her, Naesala merely placed his hand on the back of her head and drew her closer such that he could bow his head forward to kiss the top of hers. “Why did you do that?” she asked as he pulled away.

“Oh,” he looked away, ruffling her hair with the hand that still rested atop it, “just making sure that you haven’t grown devil horns yet.” Again, Leanne gently swiped at Naesala’s hand until he backed off, a grin on his face that seemed more devilish than any of Leanne’s words or expressions had been. It was accompanied by a few words of sincerity, though: “Come along, Leanne, let’s head back. You’ve made an undeniable argument. I’ll protect you next time.”

Leanne beamed and skipped up beside Naesala as he began to walk back toward camp.

“And I’ll protect you better!”