<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="color: #BFBFFF"><span style="font-size: 150%; line-height: 116%;">Lady Melina Del'Castellorosso</span><br/><span style="font-size: 120%; line-height: 116%;">'The Angel of Riace'</span></span></span></div><br/><br/><div style="text-align: center;"><a class="postlink" href="http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/o793/Galvin_Fugazi/9960c406-7aeb-4e5b-9174-36e83dbe1238_zpscc943042.jpg">[ img ]</a></div><br/><br/><div style="text-align: justify;">Melina knew that it was dangerous to tell her story to Leon, as he had some record to be not shy to use knowledge for his profit. On the other hand if she wanted to succeed with her plan, she needed Leon behind her and he was far too wary to simply trust her. She sighed deeply and then, after one last look around for eaves-droppers, she started to tell him his story. That she had to leave Firth because her love, which happened to be her brother had been killed by Sir Felix and she wanted some revenge on the bastard. How she had learned that Sir Robert was a widower and how she had tried to seduce him. Leon gave her a knowing smile at that part of the story and it made it easier for her to tell the rest. That she knew Riace would fall sooner or later to the wild folks and that she preferred to marry to the mainland to be safe. <br/><br/><span style="color: #80FF00">"So you think you can get Sir Robert to marry you? Are you really sure you want that to happen, Melina? You are a pretty young girl, even if your looks are deceiving and deep inside you are less than innocent, but I won't say you are rotten or bad. Sir Robert is an angry man with a history of brutal beatings of his daughter. You really want to marry such a man, Melina?"</span><br/><br/>Melina was surprised that Sir Leon cared about that. She started to wonder if not a lot of people had the wrong impression of the eldest son of the Earl of Eastshire. To her he seemed far than the cold, cruel bastard everybody described. She shrugged her shoulders.<br/><br/><span style="color: #FF8000">"The wild folks wouldn't be very nice to me, too. And I guess that most of Sir Robert's brutality came from the death of his wife. I have a lead to the one behind the killing and I hope that if Sir Robert gets his revenge, he will lose a bit of his aggressive streak. If not, well, he has to sleep sometimes too..."</span><br/><br/>She made a gesture with her finger over her throat. Leon laughed and tussled her hair.<br/><br/><span style="color: #80FF00">“You are quite the girl, Melina. I must say I like your ruthlessness, but I better keep you as a friend and not as an enemy. Ok, now that I know how you knew of the offer of Sir Robert, what did you want to speak about.” </span>He looked at her curiously, at Melina knew he was wondering if she wasn't the one behind the whole plan. <br/><br/><span style="color: #FF8000">"Well, be both know that Galline will not be a prize you will be satisfied with. You are aiming for the throne, not for a piece of land you may conquer after the death of Sir Robert anyway easily. Maybe the idea to strike fear in the heart of Amena may please you, but it will not make you marry her, right?"</span><br/><br/>Leon grinned again. She impressed him and she knew that he was already planning to use her one way or another.<br/><br/><span style="color: #80FF00">“My, my, you are not only pretty, you are intelligent too. Ok, you are right, and now?”</span><br/><br/>Melina blushed only slighty by the compliment. But she knew that she was close now.<br/><br/><span style="color: #FF8000">"Well, I have some plan, that may allow you to see the fear in Amena's eyes and let you go for the throne still."</span><br/><br/>Leon cocked his brow and Melina started to tell him of her plan to make a contract with Sir Robert, that he would be the one announced to Amena as her future husband, but in the end it would be his second brother Rufus to marry her. As she had heared that Rufus would do all Leon told him to do and so he would get Galline under the control of the Aeide after the death of Sir Robert. Leon seemed to be deeply impressed.<br/><br/><span style="color: #80FF00">“What will happen to you if Sir Robert dies? Then you will have no place to stay if Rufus gets the castle.”</span><br/><br/>Melina sighed, she knew it was a problem and that he saw it immediately made her respect for him growing.<br/><br/><span style="color: #FF8000">“Well, maybe we can find a solution for that then. I mean, I may be in my best years then...”</span> Melina stated dryly, knowing that it may be a problem in Leon's opinion.<br/><br/><span style="color: #80FF00">“Ok, let's assume I agree to that. You don't feel bad that you destroy the live and love of my youngest brother?”<br/></span><br/>This question hit her hard and unprepared. She had assumed that Leon hated his youngest brother and maybe he did. Maybe this question was just one out of curiousity. But she had to fight all day long with her bad conscience that she was hurting the friendly young knight, who had only been nice to her. And now there was the question how she felt about it and curious blue eyes looked at her.<br/><br/><span style="color: #FF8000">“I feel like shit, really. Yakari had been nice to me and I like him and I tried to suppress my bad conscience all day long, tried to convince myself that my own security would be more important than the life of Yakari. But I can't look in his eyes or I would start to cry. I have done a lot of bad things in my life, Leon, I am not proud of what I did, of seducing my brother, of killing my unborn kids, of all this shit. But I have never hurt someone I like and I must say it feels like the hell opens up in front of me and swallows me."</span><br/><br/>Leon had listened to her without interrupting her and when she finished and there was some water in her eyes, he put his arm around her shoulder and gave her a soft kiss.<br/><br/><span style="color: #80FF00">"Well, I know how you feel. And you will always feel like that, everytime you see him. But you are right, your own security is more important than the life of my brother. I agree to your plan, we should start to work on the contract. And we should make it in a way that it sounds harmless, innocuous. Let the contract be signed by witnesses too, so that neither the Aeide nor the Cadell can talk themselves out of it. Let's think about how we formulate it..."</span><br/><br/>Melina wiped a tear from her eye and started to think over the right words to use.</div>