Chapter 59: One Last Night

Roxanne woke to the ordinary sound of Isla banging around the room, muttering about being late for breakfast, and something about the simplicity of it settled warm in her chest before she’d even opened her eyes properly. No summons from the administration. No committee complaint waiting on her account. No scoreboard flickering between victory and suspension.

Just Isla, hopping on one foot while pulling on a shoe.

"You’re going to make us miss the eggs," Isla said.

"There will be more eggs."

"There won’t."

They made it to the dining hall in time regardless, and the four brothers joined them at the table shortly after. Liam reached across immediately to steal something off Roxanne’s plate, and Roshan slid a replacement toward her without needing to be asked, the exchange so automatic by now that neither of them commented on it. Lucien told Liam to stop for the third time that week, with about the same amount of success as always. Kai slid her favorite drink across the table without a word, already knowing which one she’d want before she’d even reached for it.

Roxanne looked around the table, taking in how naturally all four of them had folded themselves into her daily routine, so ordinary now that she barely registered it as unusual anymore.

An announcement crackled over the academy speakers midway through breakfast, informing students that with the Alpha Challenge review finally settled, the academy would host a casual Moonlight Night that evening. Outdoor lights, food stalls, music, a bonfire, games with no rankings attached and nothing at stake beyond having a good time.

Isla immediately grabbed Roxanne’s arm. "We’re going."

"Obviously we’re going," Liam said, already halfway through planning something. "We’re coming too."

"I didn’t invite you," Roxanne said.

"You don’t have to," Liam said easily. "We’re family."

The word landed somewhere unexpected, catching Roxanne slightly off guard before Liam, seeming to sense it, quickly turned it into a joke about how family also meant he got to eat off her plate without asking.

The evening arrived warm and bright with strings of lights woven through the trees along the courtyard, food stalls lined up releasing the smell of roasted nuts and something sweet Roxanne couldn’t quite place. Liam dragged her toward a ridiculous carnival game involving ring tosses, and the two of them ended up cheating shamelessly against each other, laughing so hard neither of them actually won.

Roshan wandered off at some point and returned with a small prize, a carved wooden charm he’d apparently won at a different stall entirely, handing it over without fanfare after quietly noticing which trinket she’d kept glancing at from a distance.

Lucien, meanwhile, got roped into helping Isla organize one of the games when the line grew unruly, the two of them working together with surprising efficiency until order was restored.

Kai stayed close to Roxanne through most of it, not saying much, simply present in the easy way he’d grown into over the past weeks.

Later, as the bonfire crackled and the others drifted off toward another game, Roxanne found herself sitting beside Kai on a low bench near the flames.

"Do you regret staying at the academy?" he asked. "After everything."

"No," she said.

"Do you regret joining the team?"

"No."

She glanced at him, the firelight catching the edge of his profile. "You know, you’re much easier to like when you’re not ordering me around."

Something close to a smile crossed his face. "I’ll remember that."

The quiet between them stretched, warm and comfortable, right up until something small and hard bounced off the side of Kai’s head, sailing in from across the fire.

"Sorry," Liam called out, not sounding sorry at all. "Missed."

Kai turned toward him with a look that promised retaliation later, and whatever quiet moment had settled between him and Roxanne dissolved back into ordinary chaos.

Not long after, Liam declared it was time for another round of the "who knows Roxanne best" game, except this time Roxanne got to flip the questions back on them.

"What do you actually want, Lucien?" she asked. "Beyond all this."

He considered it seriously. "Something quiet. A place that doesn’t need constant managing."

"Roshan, what do you do when you’re stressed?"

"Read the same book three times," he admitted, looking mildly embarrassed by the answer.

"Liam, what do you hate?"

"Being ignored," he said, with none of his usual joking lightness.

"And Kai. What do you actually enjoy? When nobody’s watching."

Kai was quiet a moment. "Quiet places," he said finally. "Somewhere without noise."

Roxanne laughed, genuinely surprised by half of it. She’d expected something closer to their public personas, not these small, honest pieces sitting underneath. It struck her, watching them across the firelight, that she’d stopped seeing them as four separate types entirely, and started seeing them as four separate people instead.

Near the end of the night, Isla found her by the food stalls. "You want to head back?"

Roxanne glanced toward the fire, where the brothers were now arguing loudly about something entirely trivial, Liam gesturing wildly while Roshan looked increasingly unimpressed.

"I’ll stay," she said.

It had nothing to do with any one of them specifically. It was simpler than that. She’d arrived at this academy expecting isolation, expecting to be watched and judged and eventually pushed out. Instead she had this, whatever this was, loud and messy and entirely hers now.

The academy speakers crackled to life again just as the fire began to die down.

"Attention students. Final Alpha Challenge qualifiers will begin tomorrow at 7:00 a.m."

A collective groan rose from the crowd.

Liam dropped his head onto Roxanne’s shoulder with theatrical despair. "We’re competing tomorrow? After all this?"

She pushed him off. "You were the one who insisted we should stay."

He looked at her, entirely unbothered. "Worth it."

The outdoor lights began switching off section by section, signaling the end of the night, and the five of them walked back together through the gradually darkening courtyard, voices still carrying easily between them, none of them in any particular hurry to reach their separate dorms.