Chapter 30
AIMILIA
Aimilia wasn’t entirely sure what had propelled her to go out there in the courtyard that night. She certainly hadn’t anticipated Nikias ending up in her arms or for her to be comforting him.
Worse, she certainly hadn’t expected for it to feel so…
Aimilia didn’t know how to describe it.
It should have felt strange and wrong. There should have been at least something off about it. Unfortunately, there wasn’t.
It had been almost natural.
It had felt right.
And that was the most concerning thing about the whole scene.
When Nikias had finally pulled away, his red-rimmed eyes gave away the tears he had been trying and failing to hide from her.
All he had said was a simple “thank you” and he’d helped her to her feet, murmuring something about both of them getting some rest, because there was still a long way to go.
She assumed he’d been talking about their work with the clan mages.
She hoped that had been what he’d been talking about.
Maybe it hadn’t been the smartest move to acknowledge that Nikias’ act of defiance had been his dedication to marrying her, but it was the truth. Aimilia still didn’t know what to make of it. Nikias had offered no explanation as to why he had determined he had to marry her or no one.
What did it mean?
Why?
Why would Nikias want to marry her so much he would take a beating for it?
Surely his wounded pride couldn’t be that strong. Then again, it was Nikias…
But Aimilia was now starting to wonder if she really even knew Nikias at all.
The next day Marcella and Gavril weren’t at breakfast with them.
She had no idea where they were, and she cursed them for leaving her alone with Nikias—Not that they knew anything about what happened the night before to know there’d even been something to save her from.
A lingering awkwardness. Unfortunately, Nikias hadn’t said a word either.
Although, he was now looking her in the eyes again. She was cautiously optimistic—maybe now that things were settled between them, they could go back to their old dynamic, albeit this time with less hatred and dark animosity on either side and more friendly jabs.
A novel thought. She and Nikias being friends.
Breakfast was quiet, but Nikias did make an effort to carry on a conversation. There was really nothing consequential about it, only him asking her a few questions about the estate and what she’d seen when Marcella had shown her around.
And then soon enough, they were off to the war room.
Aimilia was torn between hoping Gavril and Marcella would be there and hoping their absence at breakfast also meant that Hypatia was occupying them again for the day.
This whole ordeal would go so more smoothly if it was only Nikias and Konstantin.
When they reached the war room and Nikias let Aimilia go in first with a simple gesture of his hands, she was too wrapped up in her thoughts about where Marcella and Gavril were to think anything of it.
When his other hand brushed the small of her back as she passed by him, she nearly jumped out of her skin, startling forward and whipping her head around to see a very slight smirk on his face.
Oh, no.
She surely hoped that didn’t mean what she feared it meant.
Nikias just said, “Pardon. I didn’t mean to startle you.”
And then he reached for the doorknob, as if that had been where he’d been going the whole time to pull the door shut behind him.
That was when Aimilia turned and saw both Konstantin and Hypatia were in the room already seated, Hypatia watching the two of them with eagle-eyed sharpness, her hands curled on the arms of her chair.
A dangerous gleam was in her eyes and her lips twitched into a smirk, as if she was watching a particularly entertaining game.
She certainly didn’t look like she’d spent part of the night before being reprimanded by the only man whose power could come close to checking her own.
Nikias moved toward the table, but unlike last night, then, where his encounter had left him visibly agitated, today he was in full control.
At least, the marble facade he liked to wear was back in place.
Although not completely impassive. As Nikias moved towards the chairs, he shot Hypatia a dangerous look.
A smirk was playing on his lips, and he raised an eyebrow at her, almost like a challenge.
Whatever game the two of them were playing, Aimilia wanted no part in it. She moved to stand at attention.
Konstantin took one look at Nikias and Hypatia and he quickly shuffled his papers and cleared his throat, disrupting whatever unspoken challenge hovered in the air between the two.
“Alright, now that you’re here, we can get started. We made excellent progress yesterday. I believe we have a thorough picture of the events on your side. Now today, we will at least begin to give you a thorough picture of the events on our side.”
Nikias gave the man a nod. “Let’s begin.”
Hypatia didn’t say a word, just sat back in her seat and crossed her legs, resting her chin on her hand that leaned on the arm of her chair.
Aimilia didn’t dare open her mouth and draw any more attention to herself, especially from Hypatia.
But she couldn’t help but wonder as Konstantin’s voice filled the air that morning where Marcella and Gavril were.
Well, she supposed they didn’t really have anything to contribute to the conversation.
Neither did she. Why was she the only one there as support for Nikias when face to face with Hypatia?
What could be more important than this?
Still, Aimilia learned quite a bit as Konstantin spoke.
She did pay attention to the actions of the stone mages. Apparently they had started shortly after the treaty had been signed. It had been small at first. Little one-off occurrences. A couple Stonai sneaking into a Solitus village of one of the clans and stealing.
Then it became creeks drying up, causing issues for the Solitus farmers.
When the Solitus investigated, they came across a landslide blocking the creek.
The first three times it had happened, they were in such differing locations that no one heard about the others.
It hadn’t been until later that Konstantin had able to track down those occurrences and place them as early in the timeline as he had currently.
The Solitus had assumed they had been naturally occurring landslides.
Unfortunately, by the time Konstantin had heard of the occurrences they had been cleared by the mages and the Solitus, so he could not inspect them to be sure. But he strongly suspected they’d all been unnatural and caused deliberately by the stone mages.
Aimilia didn’t move a muscle. She just looked straight ahead, but she was able to see out of the corner of her eye when Konstantin pointed out these locations in the northmost part of the varying clans’ territories.
When he put the fifth landslide down and the tenth occurrence of Stonai activity overall down, it was in his people’s lands, Clan Montis.
That was when he’d gotten involved.
Although Aimilia didn’t quite follow how one landslide blocking a road in his territory had made him immediately connect it to the stone mages when he didn’t know of any of the other instances yet.
Especially given how he had mentioned the stone mages had chosen a road that had had a natural landslide in the past.
It made sense why they were the biggest suspect when she looked at the map overall, but Konstantin didn’t clarify what it was that had secured his accusation in the first place, enough to reach out and discover all the other instances.
However, Nikias did not ask, and Aimilia was just there as the attending commander and had no interest in inserting herself unless required to.
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Konstantin—Aimilia trusted him more than she trusted almost any clan mage—but Aimilia was a commander. She’d been trained to think of things from every angle.
The detail in just those initial incidents took the majority of the day, and once more, Konstantin cut them short only an hour or two after noon in order to go deal with a few other ‘engagements,’ as he put it.
Hypatia hadn’t said a word the entire time.
What had she been there for? Did she simply want to see Nikias squirm? Had she just wanted to put him on edge?
Although the most surprising thing was, it hadn’t seemed to work. Nikias hadn’t been rattled the whole day.
Aimilia had never been more desperate to find out exactly what Hypatia had said to him the night before that had shaken him so, but now did not seem to bother him one bit.
Aimilia briefly saw Marcella that afternoon as she wandered around the grounds again.
Marcella was in one of the courtyards surrounded by children much younger than the ones she normally was surrounded by at the Academy. All of these children had to be under ten and many of them had black curls like she did.
They were all chattering in their own tongue and pulling Marcella into some kind of game, based off Marcella’s laugh and the way the children were forming a circle and joining hands.
Aimilia didn’t interrupt. She only watched from the shadows.
Marcella was a natural with them.
Aimilia knew it was still fairly early, given that Marcella and Gavril had only been actually acting as a married couple for half a year, but she wondered if any day now Marcella would be excitedly telling her they were expecting.
Half of Aimilia hoped so, the other half of her wasn’t sure how she would react when that day came.
There were still some things she was having a hard time wrapping her head around or letting go of.
Not because of any romantic feelings still harbored for Gavril.
But letting go of something she’d held onto for so long wasn’t as simple as letting go of it once.
Aimilia had been letting go of Gavril and the future she hoped to have with him again and again and again as she welcomed Marcella into her life.
Aimilia had always known Gavril would make an excellent father.
They’d spent a few nights at the Academy talking about it, and each time was forever burned into Aimilia’s mind.
Just like Gavril rarely talked about his parents, Aimilia rarely talked about her father for completely opposite reasons, though. Both still painful.
Most days Aimilia’s desire for Gavril and Marcella’s happiness as her friends won out. That didn’t make the pain sting any less as Aimilia was looking down at the corridor of her own life and seeing nothing but shadows and question marks where she’d once had a crystal-clear road to walk.
Of course, if she became head of her house, it would be expected for her to marry and have children.
While the head of the house wasn’t passed down by blood, but by merit, the direct lineage of the head of house were typically the most promising candidates anyway, and were the ones most often to secure the position and carry on the main branch.
That was really the only future she had to consider.
As Marcella was attacked by one of the children, a voice appeared behind Aimilia and said, “I don’t follow. Is the purpose of the game to be caught or not to be caught?”
Aimilia whipped around to see Nikias standing behind her, hands clasped behind his back as he also watched Marcella fall into the dirt, laughing as two children piled on top of her, pinning her down.
Aimilia directed all of her attention to the menace behind her. “I didn’t ask, but you’re more than welcome to. In fact, I’m sure Marcella will teach you how to play if you ask. I bet the little monsters will be happy to help you figure it out.”
Nikias snorted. “A tempting offer to be sure, but not tonight, I don’t think.” Then his eyes skimmed over her briefly as a smirk spread on his lips. “Although, I’d be far more inclined to learn if you were the one educating me.”
Aimilia’s jaw dropped. He wasn’t serious, was he?
Was he just joking?
He couldn’t be—
Aimilia huffed as heat flooded her cheeks. “Well, I certainly won’t be teaching anyone anything anytime soon, certainly not you. Now, if you’ll excuse me. I was only here looking for Gavril.”
Nikias’ mirthful expression faltered. “It seems we had the same mission. That’s exactly what I came here for, as well.”
Aimilia highly doubted that.
He cleared his throat. “Shall we look together?”
Aimilia lifted her chin, hoping nothing in her expression betrayed the way her heart was racing. “No. I changed my mind. I have a few letters I have to write. So you’ll have to find him on your own.”
Before Nikias could reply, she spun on her heel and disappeared. She did actually. A message from Turpis had arrived. Unfortunately he had little news of her grandfather and his health, but she’d promised to reply anyway.
Even as she walked away, her heart was still fluttering and she couldn’t rid her cheeks of the heat taking over them.
And even though she should be cursing herself for ever having gone after him, she didn’t regret it. She spent that night tossing and turning, but the phantom sensation of Nikias clutching her in his arms would not let her go.
She let out a soft, frustrated huff as she turned and looked out the window to see the empty courtyard.
No Nikias.
Why had she been hoping to see him?
Why was she wishing he was down there, waiting for her to come to him so he could hold her like she was something to lose and finally explain why he would marry her and no one else?
She pressed her fingertips to her heart, trying to slow it as she kept staring at the window. These strange sensations would disappear eventually. They had to.
Aimilia fell asleep, still facing the window and wishing the blankets around her were a pair of strong, solid arms. Her dreams were full of green eyes and what it might sound like if a certain voice called her his amata.