Yes, perhaps we shall, for that is, indeed, where all good stories begin.

In the old days, there was one big country by the name of Ymenia, ruled by King Marullus, said to be the greatest king there ever was. Since all kings make sure the people under their reign say something to the effect of them being the greatest kings ever, that statement may seem to be of no consequential value. But it must be noted, that while King Marullus made quite a disastrous number of political errors in his time, relatively speaking, he was quite a delightful person and good ruler.

But that is a matter that we are not concerned with.

Those were the days of prosperity and peace. No fear did the people of Ymenia ever know � not beyond reason, in any case. No fear, no pain, and no war. The biggest predicaments the country faced were natural. Acts of the Gods, they were called. Acts that nobody would ever blame upon anyone else. Acts such as earthquakes and floods, which no human could possibly bear the responsibility of. Ymenia, a country of wild forests, rugged mountains, and untamed birds and beasts, was a peaceful land.

Things began to go wrong� well, things began to go wrong in a time and place where this story does not go. But things began to go REALLY wrong when King Marullus passed away without leaving behind a will. Neither of his twin sons � Amos and Mios � had been crowned. The death of their father, needless to say, was untimely. So great had he been, that people had expected him to live for over a hundred years. His heart, however, seemed to have other plans, and failed the expectations of the people in the dead of the night. King Marullus had often voiced his hope that his two sons could rule his kingdom together. But they, like his heart, had other ideas. And instead of doubling the prosperity as their father had hoped, they split it in equal halves, which came to be known as Lajandra and Tzorke � after the wife and the wife of the royal treasurer of Amos and Mios respectively � the greatest kingdoms in the world.

Well, not really, but one, as a writer, does not want to put in dusty musty cells for expressing one�s opinions, one must express someone else�s.

There was a split in the kingdom, in the territory, in the wealth of the nation� sorrowful, but we�re not here to reminisce the past and feel the sorrow we don�t truly know much about. Tzorke was a smaller country, more rugged and wild, but full of riches buried within the surface of the earth. Lajandra was bigger, greener, perhaps a little less rich, but definitely more prosperous.

In the years that followed, Tzorke and Lajandra faced many wars, mostly against each other. Lajandra made progress, and her boundaries grew wider, her people happier, and her royal treasury heavier. Tzorke, on the other hand, was ravaged. Beaten by ghastly, cold weather in almost all months of the year, bruised by war and natural disasters. She was a broken country, and continued to break down further and further. Every twenty years or so, war would break out, and some country or the other would claim their rights upon another one of Kutou�s many districts, all rich in either gold or silver.

One of the most controversial wars was fought with her sister, Lajandra, over the district of Lamarke, known for its rich deposits of gold. It was, actually, quite clear that Lajandra had won the war. But this was the richest part of their country, and Tzorke was, as can be expected, most reluctant to give it up. A meeting of the royal council of advisors was called, which did no good to anyone to speak of. The question proposed to them sounded simple enough � �what ARE we to do?� � but no one had an answer that would suit the rest. It was sometime between the starting of the meeting and the ending of the same that the wisest advisor realised that war was an inevitable prospect. Sadly enough, he sat back and let it happen, letting the streams of blood flow and the number of bodies rise further and further, until finally, someone called for a retreat, and once more, wars and such were put off until further notice, thank you very much. Hereafter, the clean up job ensued.

On and off, the two countries would quarrel over the district, and each time, it would be passed to a different owner.

However, at the particular dawn we were discussing, the war that had just been fought, and lost, had nothing to do with Lamarke, and was not fought with Lajandra. This war was perhaps the most devastating war in a series of twenty terrible conflicts. It had lasted for a prolonged period of thirty years, during which the assailant, Sairou, had plundered the already plundered country of Kutou, looting the smaller nation to add it its own store of stolen gold.

But the war was over. Beaten soldiers returned to destroyed villages, streams of blood, and piled upon piles of bodies. The boundaries of Kutou had been shortened considerably, and the rich deposits of gold and silver were no longer rich. The terrain to the north, beyond the rugged range of mountains, was lost to the greedy country of Sairou, who had roughly claimed that which was not hers. What remained behind was a vast stretch of tall mountains, deep valleys, and the small forest that lay in between. Kutou was no longer a wealthy country, her strong and powerful rank lost with her riches. She was now small and insignificant, battered by cold weather and scarred by a war she could never have hoped to win.

Their king was dead, and his place had been filled by his son, who himself was middle-aged. The new king, perhaps, was the only good outcome of the war. Huang III had been a gentle prince. Everybody had expected Marullus VII, his elder brother, to be king, but the war had claimed the fiery warrior, and Huang III had succeeded. But the people were glad to have a gentleman as their king and not a warrior. Nobody was keen on being led into another war by a headstrong warrior of a king. They wanted peace and quiet, and with all their riches gone and Huang III on the throne, they knew that they could expect just that.

But this is not a story about King Marullus (I or VII), and this is not a story about King Huang III.

This is a story about a girl. A headstrong, passionate princess of a girl who did things in strange ways. Whose entire philosophy of life clashed horribly with standard concepts of living. It is a story about finding oneself. About finding a purpose. It is a story of love. Of heartrending love, and the pain that comes with it. About friendship, and what it means to be a friend. About the truth, and how, no matter how hard we think it would be to believe it, when the time comes, we accept it with ease. About serenity found at the end of the road�

So let�s get on with it.

It was a cold grey dawn, the morning after war, and the silence that had fallen upon the country of Tzorke was neither peaceful, nor comforting. Perhaps having the familiarity of sound � screams, shouts, blood-curdling howls, just� noise � taken away from them was making the atmosphere uncomfortable� or perhaps it was just that there was nothing to celebrate. It hardly mattered.

One could just see the outline of the sun beyond the frozen hills. On the other side, the sky was dark, and the stars still shone down upon the cold country. It was freezing cold, and an icy wind blew through the land of Kutou, making old people and children shiver in their beds, and the others close the windows that banged open, worried looks on their worn faces. The deep valleys, the ends of which were marked by a frozen river, gleamed in the early morning light. Yes, the darkest hour was ending, and in more ways than one.

A thirteen-year-old boy stood against the cold wind and glared at the rising sun. In his eyes was a look that no one expected to see in the eyes of a boy so young. But this was because people were inclined to show a stupefying amount of lenience and indifference towards anyone who doesn�t look old enough to �be an adult�. He stood at the very top of a hill, his eyes wide open and his brows furrowed in thought. The cold did not seem to bother him, even though all he wore to protect himself from it was a worn out coat.

�Aki!�

A voice behind him made him turn around, even though he really did not need to do so to know who it was. Kumiko. Slender, worn looking Kumiko, twenty and still unmarried. Women of her age had babies at their breasts, and all Kumiko had was a wrung look about her. She had been born during the war, like Aki, and like him, and all the other children at the school, she had no idea who her parents were. She was taller than him, something that he had always disliked, but she seemed to think he was catching up, and that soon, he would tower over her. Aki hoped so, because she was really not all that tall and being shorter than her was a little infuriating. Kumiko was climbing, with ease, the hillside, calling out his name to get his attention.

She came up, panting, looking at the boy with curious, light eyes. �Aki�?�

�Good morning,� said the boy, as though it was perfectly normal for someone to be out of bed at such an hour.

�You should not be out here� it�s too cold.�

�I don�t feel cold,� said Aki, looking at her pointedly, for she had said this a million times before, and he had said the same thing in response every time. �You know that.�

�What are you doing out here?� asked Kumiko, shivering in the early morning wind.

�Thinking.� And that was all she could get out of him. She knew better than to ask him about what. That amused him, for some reason, and he led her through a dance, a game of questioning and avoiding, and she never got the truth out of him at the end in any case. So she just nodded, and sat down, looking at the rising sun in silence.

They did this quite often, coming up to the top of the hill watching the sunrise. Or the sunset. Or the afternoon sun, or the moon, or the stars, or the stormy, dark clouds which ever so often gathered to rain big, heavy, cold drops of water upon Tzorke. They never spoke much. It was just the silence of it all that beckoned to them both. Both were orphans, and both were too old to ignore the war and its effects in the way that the little children at their orphanage were told to. It was clear what was going on, and it was all the more clear what it was doing to them all.

But it was over now. It was over, and that was a concept that was rather unfamiliar to them. A life without war� waking up in the mornings without having to worry about whether they would get to see the end of the day.

�It�s been a cold winter, Kumiko,� said Aki, quietly.

In the Palace of Lajandra, a princess was born.

�But it�s over now,� said Kumiko, looking at him with her light brown eyes wide. Aki did not look at her.

Somewhere in the depths of the forests of Tzorke, a young girl screamed and tried to run as fast as she could from a drunkard she was forced to call her father.

�It will come again.� Aki�s voice was as cold as the wind.

A young brother awoke in a cottage in the hills, and made room for his sister, troubled by nightmares, in his bed.

�Well,� said Kumiko, in a voice she used when she was trying to comfort a child at the orphanage who had lost a toy, �look on the bright side. It�s a beautiful morning.�

Aki rolled his eyes at her, as she grinned foolishly, a grin which was meant to hide the true feelings of fear and sorrow. The wind blew harder as Kumiko put her smaller hand into his still developing one. They stayed there for a while longer, and then went back down to the orphanage, leaving behind an echoing silence.