Smile

He could always appreciate a smile from her. A true smile, not one of her regal smiles, cold and unfeeling. He was several years younger than her, but her sophisticated demeaner compared to his childish behavior made it seem like centuries.

He laughed at the people who believed they were a foolish match for each other.

He was her foil.

Where she was stony, he was expressive. Where she was ruthless, he had compassion. Opposites attract as his former queen, Eddis, might put it.

He cherished the rare smiles Attolia gave him when she called him an idiot and laughed at him. To this he would jokingly reply, "But I'm your idiot, my queen." She would playfully hit him over the head.

It was her smile that made his heart beat faster and his knees go weak. Her smile was one of the few things that could knock the once great Thief of Eddis off balance.

So, to those who thought they were anything but a match made in heaven, they were dead wrong. Because he had given up everything in his peaceful heaven in Eddis to come to this Attolian hell just so he could make the ice queen smile.