10. Everything Sucks Until It Doesn’t #2
My brain stalled. I stared down at the box, my tongue tripping over the sudden surge of confusion. “W-what? But why? You can go back now. You heard Morrigen; he said it was safe. Wasn't… wasn't that what you were waiting for all along? To go home?”
“‘Home’?” A short, dry sound escaped him—a laugh without humour. He dragged a hand through his hair, tugging at his braid. “I am home, Elian. Can't you see it? I’m only home when I’m with you.”
The world seemed to blur at the edges. The box fell from my hand and onto the lawn. Speechless and gaping, I stood, unable to process the gravity of what he’d said.
“So…” I faltered, my sluggish mind refusing to draw the conclusion. He needed to say it. I needed to hear the words spoken, clear as day, with no room for misinterpretation.
“So I am staying here with you. If you’ll have me.” His calloused hands enveloped mine, warm and strong. “You’re absolutely sure you don’t have a Binding Match handy? Hidden in another fancy box somewhere?” He winked.
I shook my head, my lips tugging into a weak smile.
“Well, I’m certain you can invent one within two days. That's plenty of time for an alchemical genius of your expertise.”
I wrung my hands, nerves fluttering at the bottom of my stomach. “But what if I can’t?”
“I’ll take my chances. I’m staying,” he repeated.
“For… like forever?” I whispered.
“That's it, pumpkin. Forever.”
At the deep ring of sincerity in his voice, relief hit me, so profound it was almost dizzying.
Yet, just as quickly, dark doubts rode in on a wave of insecurity, scratching the surface of my mind.
Responsibility lay stitched into the very lining of this man’s character.
By choosing me, he relinquished his status, stripping himself of his entire identity.
Would that sacrifice rot into resentment two years down the line?
Could a quiet life in a municipal marketplace ever satisfy a worldly vanguard officer?
Or would the phantom weight of his abandoned burdens eventually poison our joy?
Kill’em scrutinised my face and sighed. “I can almost see those frantic little cogs turning inside your brain. Don’t misunderstand, Elian.
I am not doing this for you. I am doing this for me.
I have fought this battle in my mind for far too long.
I felt weak, ashamed and guilty for abandoning my post. Like a lesser man, a failure of a soldier.
But to be honest, I’m tired of fighting, tired of the slaughter.
Enough. From now on, the only thing I’m determined to fight for is us. That is the selfish truth of it.”
He paused, his gaze softening as he looked down at our joined hands.
“I want to live my life for myself and be happy. It’s a basic, simple concept, yet I’ve never had it.
I want the luxury of a choice. Maybe I won’t be able to protect my realm, my queen or my men anymore; they must look to others now.
But I will protect you. I will look after our friends and the marketplace.
To throw away what we've already built would make me a damn idiot. If losing that old life means losing my honour—”
“Nothing you do could ever make you lose your honour.” The words squeezed their way past my tight throat, emerging hoarse and scratchy. “You are the most honourable person I know. And after all the sacrifices you’ve made, you deserve to choose your own destiny more than anyone else.”
A traitorous sob escaped me. I sniffled straight against his chest, wetting the indigo silk of his tunic. Snot or not, Kill’em didn’t even flinch. He produced a clean handkerchief from his vambrace, dabbing at my face with infinite patience.
“You’re sure?” I mumbled into the fabric at last. “Completely sure?”
“Affirmative. Damn certain.” A rare laugh huffed from his chest. “I’ve been sure for a while. Just needed time to digest the logistics. Now then, will you have me as your real hus—”
“Don’t talk nonsense,” I said, delivering a slap to his arm and then resisting the urge to massage my throbbing palm.
It felt like smacking a stone pillar. “You are my real husband. In my heart and on the paperwork. Trying to wiggle out of your legal duties, Chief Renyés? A contract is a contract.” I grinned.
“Our market regulations allow a three-day window to return a product. No returns accepted past the deadline.”
Kill’em gazed at me with delicious intensity. “No returns wanted, Elian,” he murmured. He took a slow, deliberate step forwards, his posture shifting into a predatory stance.
A thrill coiled in my chest, a sudden heat pooling deep in my abdomen.
I loved it when he ‘hunted’ me this way, and he enjoyed pursuing me in those little games, too.
I stepped back, moving on tiptoes across the grass until…
my spine encountered the sharp, biting thorns of the raspberry shrubs behind me. I gave an undignified squeak.
That sound doubled into another even higher-pitched squeal when the world tilted a moment later as Kill’em scooped me off my feet before I could scramble away from the bushes.
Carrying me back towards the house, he marched straight through the back door and into our bedroom, not even panting once.
He set me down so my back pressed to the solid cottage wall.
He allowed no distance between us. Placing one palm flat on the wood just above my head, he leant in with excruciating slowness. Ever so fine, ever so domineering. He lifted my chin with his long index finger and his blue gaze—frosty yet scorchingly hot—locked onto my own. His parted lips met mine.
In all my years of trading, I’d never been kissed to seal a deal before. But despite that, I knew exactly what purpose this one served—to impose a permanence clause on our futures, binding us in a contract no marketplace regulator could ever void.
Ke?lhem
Over the next two days, I managed our market post with Settie’s assistance.
The customer traffic didn’t relent. If anything, the steady rush of bargain-hunting elves intensified as we surged into the final stretch ahead of the season’s closing ceremony.
The volume of crowds storming our booth reminded me of being besieged during my Radvadur campaign.
Elian, his eyes absent and his mind far away, sat farther behind the counter, glued to his new makeshift workstation.
He’d declared inventing the Binding Match the potential biggest breakthrough of his life.
And, judging by the potent aura he emitted—and the amount of alchemical soot on his forehead–it must have been true.
Morrigen had advised us not to separate until the tethering enchantment could be performed, so Elian had to abandon work from his proper home laboratory during the day. He remained within arm's reach at all times, and I complained very little about the arrangement.
The entire group had awaited our decision with brittle, poorly concealed nerves. When we broke the news to them at the market the day after the dance we’d failed to attend, their genuine relief struck me as almost comical. Though I had to admit, I felt a touch sentimental.
Fern remained the calmest of them, of course. He smiled, leaning against a crate of his fresh herbs. “It was obvious to me from the start that you two were fated. I did say so right away, didn’t I? No idea why you tried to fight it.”
Settie, however, burst into tears and threw her arms around my neck, nearly choking me.
“This is grand!” she sobbed into my collarbone.
“Goddess, now we can finally advance to level fifty of Warlords. You know there’s a local tournament after the season finishes? We should enrol and kick some arses.”
Verity merely grinned, looking pleased, while Morrigen began bombarding Elian with highly theoretical, magic-related questions that went over my head.
Having to invent something so complex under tight time constraints, with life-or-death implications no less, had placed an enormous weight on Elian’s shoulders.
Yet, I’d noticed a strange quirk in my husband's character.
When the pressure concerned his craftsmanship—a domain where he reigned supreme—he held himself together with resilience and fortitude.
In contrast, the minor, trivial frictions of daily life could easily unmoor him, sending him into a downward tailspin of anxiety and inner doubt.
That said, he’d still suffered two distinct moments of crisis.
The first involved the structural design of the binding spell. Elian tried his best to explain the alchemical process to me over a cold lunch, but the mechanics of magic felt too abstract to my military mind.
“You see, at first I thought I would simply reverse the blueprint behind the Match of Interdimensional Return,” he rambled, gesturing with a half-eaten fruit pastry, sending the crumbs flying everywhere.
“But while there was a fair bit of logic to that approach, it failed. The thing is, the permanent anchor requires an inverted polarity. So now I realise that to compensate for the pressure of the rift, I have to place triple the distribution–”
Once Elian broke into a full-fledged alchemical monologue, I couldn’t contribute much to the discussion.
I listened to his reflections, but I focused more on admiring the sight before me, my heart swelled.
Animated, with his cheeks flushed and eyes gleaming, Elian looked glowing in this phase of his creative process.
I didn't understand much of his tirades, but the peace and joy I felt by simply watching him talk confirmed that I’d made the right choice to stay.
Elian’s second meltdown hit harder. It occurred in the small hours of the morning, when he walked straight out of the cottage and onto the empty street. He had this slightly deranged air about him, his gaze vacant and his hair tangled into a mop, and he refused to come back inside.