Dejen

Desta was nine minutes younger then Dejen. He knew this because his father had told him so. You're older, and you're the boy, you have to protect her. His father would say. Dejen tried to protect her. He never let the other kids pick on her. He always gave her the best food when they had to share. He even tried to stay awake longer then Desta when they went to bed at night. Later when their parents died, he tried to protect her still. He didn't let her see them when he found their bodies. He never told her how they died. He never let her see the vision in his mind that he could never unsee. He shared every other thought with her, just not that one. He tried to find work, but nobody wanted a nine year old for jobs that could be better done by older men. In the end he failed to protect them both and somehow they ended up in debt and fighting to pay their way out of it.

He tried to protect her in the pits too. He faced foe after foe, lost fight after fight, exhausted and too broken even to paint pictures in his mind for Desta to see when they went to bed at night. Again he failed to protect her when she finally snapped. He knew it was coming, he could feel the beast growing inside Desta every time she watched him fight. He could almost hear the leash snap when she finally let the beast out. Desta-monster was scary to watch, scary and beautiful. She came at Dejen's opponent with bare hands and with the sheer force of her ferocity ripped flesh from the man's face. Half the man's size and she still beat him down, using her quickness against his weak points, his joints, his eyes, his... well let's just say he didn't stay conscious for long. And then when the guards tried to stop her she took them out too. Dejen didn't knew if the guards or the trainer would ever fully recover, he only knew he would never be able to protect Desta again. He did think that perhaps he could make her job a bit easier... a little nudge here, and thought slipped into another mind like a knife in the dark, and Desta might just survive long enough to save them both...