Chapter 142: Alden and Seris [2]

Seris paused and looked over.

Alden held his half-eaten skewer out across the table. He looked totally relaxed, like he was just offering simple advice.

Seris looked at the skewer. Then at his face.

’Wha... Just what does he think he’s doing?’ she thought, and her chest did something she had not given it permission to do. In every culture she had ever encountered, sharing food from one’s own skewer meant something. It was not a nothing gesture.

"What’s with that look? Just take it. Don’t make me lean over like this forever, will you?" he said, nodding toward the piece he was holding out. "Try it."

She looked at his clear, calm eyes.

He was looking at the street.

’He’s either completely oblivious or completely deliberate right now, and I genuinely cannot tell which.’

"You’re giving me yours?" she asked, keeping her voice neutral.

"You’d like it," he said simply, still not looking at her.

Seris leaned forward.

She took a bite directly off his skewer, and the glaze hit her tongue and she sat back. A breathtakingly warm expression settled onto her face, the unguarded kind she didn’t wear often.

"Yes, it really is better."

Alden smiled, looking back at her. "See?"

Seris leaned back in her seat, watching him with narrowed eyes and a playful smirk. The familiar teasing look was back.

"You’re being strangely considerate today, Alden." A pause. "Though if I’m being honest, I’d still rather have your blood than anything on this platter."

Alden stiffened. "Don’t make it weird."

She laughed softly, "Fine. I’ll save the teasing." She went back to her food, thoroughly entertained with herself.

Alden looked away, pretending to observe the passing military wagons with great personal interest.

His right hand slipped into his coat pocket, fingers brushing the small velvet box inside.

He glanced at her sideways.

The moment just hadn’t come yet.

She was eating peacefully, chin resting in her other hand, watching the street.

’Not yet,’ he decided, and let the box go.

He had somewhere specific in mind.

When the plates were empty, Alden looked over at the merchant. "That was incredible, sir. What do we owe you?"

The old man waved both hands immediately, not even entertaining it. "Nothing! Go on, go on!"

Alden frowned. "We can’t just eat your food and walk away."

Seris nodded firmly beside him. "Please. At least let us pay."

The merchant shook his head with a smile. He looked at their uniforms again.

"Think of it as something small from me to you," he said quietly. "You’re going to be out there on the frontlines when the war comes, aren’t you?"

Alden and Seris exchanged a brief glance.

"Then that’s more than enough payment," the old man said. "Come back safe. Protect this city and the people in it. If you do that, a couple of grilled fish is the least I can offer."

Alden’s expression softened completely.

Seris smiled. "We will."

Both of them bowed slightly before turning away. "Thank you for the meal."

"Come back whenever you like!" The merchant waved them off with the cheerful ease of someone who meant every word of it.

They walked back into the street together. The evening had gone full night now, the sky above the city dark and clear and full of stars that looked brighter from inside the capital than they ever did anywhere else.

The lanterns along the stalls and military camps cast everything in a warm amber glow.

Seris put a hand over her stomach and exhaled. "I’m full." She looked toward the distant silhouette of the academy. "We should head back. Everyone from Apothesis has probably returned by now."

"Probably," Alden agreed.

He stopped walking.

Seris noticed and slowed, turning toward him.

[Concept: Flight Activated] 𝑓𝑟ℯℴ𝓂

The wings came out before she could finish turning. A rush of wind swept around his legs and expanded outward as the massive, radiant wings unfolded from his back with a sharp gust that lifted her hair.

Seris stared at the wings, then slowly looked at his face. "...Don’t tell me we’re going back to the academy the exact way I think we are."

Alden grinned broadly. "Exactly." He took a step closer to her. "Just like last time."

Seris sighed with her whole body. "You really do sound like a complete pervert sometimes."

"Did I?"

"Constantly." She looked up at the dark sky, then back at him with the expression of someone who has already made their decision and is just finishing the sentence for completeness. "I’m too tired to walk all the way back after that much food anyway. Fine."

Alden smiled. "Good choice."

He scooped one arm under her back and the other beneath her knees, lifting her cleanly into his arms before they took off into the air.

The kingdom dropped away beneath them fast. The lanterns became small and scattered, the wagons became tiny, the sounds of the preparation below became distant and then just wind. They rose into the cool night air above the capital, and Seris’s arms tightened around his neck on instinct as they climbed.

She looked down.

The whole city spread out below them in warm gold and shadow, the streets winding between buildings, the military camps lit up in clusters, the distant walls of the capital marked with guards who were dots from this height.

Something on her face went quiet and open.

"It still feels amazing," she said, just loud enough to carry over the wind. "Same as the first time."

Alden glanced at her profile against the dark sky.

"I wish I had wings of my own," she murmured softly, looking at the stars ahead.

He didn’t say anything. He just kept looking at her face.

She was the same person she had been the first day he met her, the one who had walked up to him with calculated elegance and a plan he hadn’t known was a plan. She had been a character he created, a villain with a purpose.

And then she had kept being real in ways he hadn’t written.

She had a past he never wrote. Deep wounds from a family he never planned. A quiet stubborn strength that stayed with her through every pain he put into this world without knowing the cost.

He had spent a long time telling himself she was a character. A fictional person. Something he could keep at a safe distance.

He had spent just as long knowing that wasn’t working.

’When did this happen?’ he thought, knowing the answer right away. He knew the exact moment. He had just been too scared to face it until he almost lost her on that snowy mountain, where fear suddenly stopped mattering. He had fallen for the villain right in front of him.

He looked forward, into the night air, and made a quiet decision.

He landed softly in the garden.

Seris straightened and looked around, and then her eyebrows pulled together. "Why here?"

Alden looked around too, as if assessing his own navigation. The royal garden. The fountain at the center, the moonlight hitting the water.

The same place where she had told him everything, and where she had told him she liked him, and where he had given her the most honest and also most painful answer he had ever given anyone.

"I thought it might be good to bring back some memories," he said, setting her down gently beside the edges of fountain.

Seris narrowed her eyes. "Is this your way of teasing me about the confession."

"No." He held both hands up. "That’s genuinely not what I meant."

She looked at him for a second, let out a slow breath, and pressed her hands to her knees to stand up. "I’m going to bed."

"Wait."

His hand caught her wrist.

Seris stopped mid-motion. She was half-standing, half-turned, one hand still on the stone edge of the fountain. She looked back at him over her shoulder.

His fingers were loose around her wrist.

"What is it?" Her voice had a tiny hint of something that was not really anger. It sounded more like she was guardedly preparing herself for whatever he was about to say.

Alden didn’t answer right away.

He looked at her.

Not the quick sideways glances he had been giving all day. He looked at her, directly, with nothing in the way.

And for the first time all day, all week, all the months of running circles around what was true, there was no hesitation in his face.

Seris caught the shift in his expression. Her brow furrowed.

"...Alden?"

He breathed in once, steady and slow.

"I like you, Seris."

The night went dead quiet.

Seris froze. Her eyes went wide, and her cool, calm face completely vanished. She looked like someone who had just heard something she thought was totally impossible.

Her lips parted, but no sound came out. She just stared at him, trying to process what he had just said.

"...What?" she said.