PeaceMaker

"Then what do we do? If most of the people at camp already have a job or are supporting other people with their job, then what method/approach are we going to take?" Litian asked.

"That's what this meeting is for," Dominic sighed, running his hand through his hair stiffly, "I would've come up with a solution prior to this meeting, but my health was my focus then."

"That's ok, your highness," Litian smiled, "if you didn't heal then, we wouldn't be here today."

"Right," Dominic grinned, "but for now, it's time to figure out solutions. The villagers don't fully trust us and not being able to lead them through thins upcoming time would be an even clearer sign to them that we are incapable of trusting."

"I agree," Litian nodded, "any idea of what we should do Strategist Feline?"

Feline took another sip of tea, this time to clear her mind. Thoughts were flowing in, but not related to the issue at hand. She was confused. 'I am the strategist...right? Then why…' She turned to Axel and scowled again, "why is he taking my job?!'

"So we need a way to plant, prepare clothing for people, all while healing the soldiers that are injured?" Feline muttered, looking up to the people staring at her, "and worse we don't have that much time?"

"Yes. I'm sure that if we weren't as inconvenienced as we are right now, we would be able to do all of these things but now we're even struggling with feeding everyone," Axel sighed

'He's allowed to freely speak in a conversation?' Feline pondered, glancing at Dominic to see any signs of annoyance or anger when Axel spoke, but he instead had a relieved expression, 'does this mean he's been speaking to him and getting help from him this entire time? More than that, he has permitted him to speak in meetings because he trusts him and the words that come out of his mouth?'

"I'm sure we're all well aware of the issues at hand and repeating them would make us grow more anxious and hinder our thought processes," Feline sighed, placing her tea down after her fifth long sip in the last 15 minutes, "I'm sure this is the first time we've faced this, but we have an example of someone who has faced this before us."

"Huh?" Dominic murmured.

"Miss. Milti, you've been part of a small village before, how did you deal with something like this?" Feline asked.

Axel glanced at Feline and then turned to Desilva, 'Ah... The sample approach. Why didn't I think of that?'

"Deal with issues like this?" Desilva muttered.

"Yes, I'm sure your village has been here for a while, right?" Feline continued.

"Yes," Deislva answered.

"Then I'm sure you've faced many difficulties like this before, how did you solve them?" Feline asked.

"I-" Desilva began, her voice cutting off soon after. Waves of memories flooded in and she tried to stay afloat, "um...ah…"

Axel turned to Desilva, concern seeping unto his face at her inability to reply. 'I knew it, she wasn't ready to answer' Axel sighed, his gaze switching to annoyance when he looked at Feline.

"Asking about that might be a trigger since the situation we are talking about is really dire… she may have faced something similar back then," Axel intruded.

Feline's teeth grinded against each other. 'How dare he?' she growled. "Yes but now it isn't just about her. It's about OUR kingdom and their village. We can't just overlook the fact that we have a perfect sample to build off of just because she doesn't know how to move on."

A stone is tossed into the calm waters in Axel's cold stare. "Move on?" he muttered.

"Yes. We're in the middle of finding out if we can survive the other months and need a way to survive quickly, yet you want us to wait till someone learns to grow from their past while we drown in anxiety?" Feline refuted, a scowl showing on her pretty face. "I don't know but that is ridiculous. My life is not going to depend on one person realizing when to move on."

The ripples in his calm eyes slowly grew wider as they spread into his mind. "Does that give you the right?" Axel retorted, his voice dropping several levels as his gaze grew colder.

"Excuse me?" Feline muttered, his head retracting a bit as she was taken aback by his comment.

"What gives you the right to demean someone's emotions just because you feel like there's something else you care about more than them at the moment?" Axel asked, his hands behind his back clenched, "the way you say things makes it feel like you're the most important thing here at the moment. 'My life'? What about hers?"

"What?" Feline muttered, her grip on her teacup handle tightening.

"Do you think she would be here if she didn't want to help you? You make it sound like we would be here if we didn't get their help at the beginning, like the community we have right now was not built with both of our hands and we're accepting their help only because they're an option," Axel growled, his veins starting to show from clenching his jaw too hard, "she's betraying her village by not even telling them she's our prince's escort and you're going to demean her feelings like this? We're lucky she didn't just walk away with her village after getting the help that they needed and is actually trying to stick around and help us. Don't treat her like her past and feelings don't matter because after all, they are the make or breaks of us surviving."

"W-when did I do that?" Feline stuttered, unable to form sentences after Axel's comments. The pressure his eyes placed on her seemed to act like a filter for her words, "All I said is that our future is placed on her words at this point and I would rather she don't waste our time by delaying."

"Our future? She could leave if she wanted and her village will be fine since they have survived it before. We are the ones at stake so stop trying to act arrogant and pretend like her words aren't like saving graces. Treat her like her words can actually save us because they will and not like she's just an option and she had the pleasure to be picked," Axel refuted, his face twisting into a scowl, "this isn't a show of who has more power. We are in need of help and we should be begging her for it instead of trying to force her into it with a false sense of power."

Feline's mouth opened before closing into a thin line. She looked at Dominic, waiting for him to defend her words or even silence him but there was no reply.

They stood in a tense air for a moment before Dominic let out a chuckle, his lips curling into a chilling smile.

"Quite frankly I do not care about this argument and I will not be picking sides. I know what I came here to do," Dominic locked eyes with Feline, giving a tiny cold smile, "it will be nice if we all learned our places right?"

Axel slowly calmed down and eased back into his standing position beside Dominic and Feline looked away, taking a sip of her tea.

"Now that that's settled," Dominic chuckled, turning to Desilva with his smile, "I would like to hear from my escort herself."