“I think you were right Pyp. Portius’ foal certainly as the legs of a racer. Especially when he almost kicked you!” She laughed heartily at Pyp’s scowl as they hiked back up the path to the villa from the city. The path to the village was marred by potholes and more than once had they tripped on an upturned stone. Mud crusted along the hem of Calista’s saffron robe. “Father really must repair these roads,” she added as an afterthought.
“I fell five times!” Pyp boasted proudly, puffing out his chest and tossing his dark hair in pride. Very much resembling, Calista thought, the self-same prized horse they had just visited.
Pyp grew quiet for a moment and then reached over to quickly hug Calista. “I’m going to miss you, Caly. When you get married. And when I start with my tutor.”
“Oh,” Calista knelt down and gave him a hug, feeling a huge wave of tenderness for her little brother. He would become wrapped in preparing to assume leadership of the Empire in some capacity and playing with his older sister would become a humiliating past time, something relegated to the memories of early boyhood. He would leave her to sport with boys of his own age, court girls, and carouse. He would not be her sweet, innocent younger brother but someone else entirely. Even if that future was far off, suddenly it became frighteningly tangible. She did not wish to lose the connection she had with her little brother due to something so abstract as the passage of time.
“Argh!” he yelled, writhing in Calista’s violently tightened embrace, trying vigorously to liberate himself from this oh-so embarrassing spectacle. “Calista! I can’t breathe! Don’t hug me!”
“Why ever not?” she asked. Perhaps that intangible future was even closer than she had thought.
Pyp jerked his thumb. “Maro is standing right there! He’ll think,” Pyp blanched, “that I like hugs.”
Calista laughed at his self-righteous countenance. Winking at Maro, who was carrying a basket of field mushrooms behind them, she kissed Pyp’s plump cheeks pink. “You like kisses, too.”