Oso

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Location: Grand Ballroom
Time: Evening
Interactions: Olivia @potter, Charlotte @princess
Mentions: Lorenzo @FunnyGuy, King Edin
Outfit: Bro Be Looking SO DAMN GOOD oh maw gawd

---

For a moment… A long moment… All Cassius heard was Olivia’s revelation about the Fearless Spell. Her words played and replayed in his mind repeatedly as his suspicions about the involvement of magic in Charlotte’s demeanor tonight became a confirmed reality.

“I will try not to use the book unless I need to.”

That’s what she had told him. That’s what Cassius had believed. There were parts of him, frustrated bits deep in his core, that wanted to be angry with her. But he wasn’t. There were things he wished he would say to her about it all. But he wouldn’t.

Because there was more of him that simply wanted to let her have what peace she could tonight than there were pieces of him that wanted to confront her for going back on her word.

“I will try...”

“…unless I need to.”

He realized in that moment hat perhaps she had chosen her words carefully. There was no absolute in what she had said, and plenty of wiggle room. She had not lied, but gods he had hoped she wouldn’t even feel like she had needed to delve into the very thing that was endangering this entire kingdom. Had there been a way he could have helped her avoid such a choice? His jaw tightened as a guilt he didn’t even quite understand bubbled beneath the surface with the very thought that somehow he could have changed this outcome.

The parts of him that prioritized her peace were indeed far greater than the other parts of him tonight, and thus he decided… At least for the moment… To let sleeping dogs lie. But it was in that very moment that Cassius had made a subconscious realization, and the subsequent decision that he could not leave her side during it all. Not even for a second.

And of course...right on bloody cue...

Before he could even respond to the proposal of games or pranks or food… Fate proved to be a cruel mistress, and just like that… the very peace he had chosen to protect was shattered for her in an instant.

The outburst by Lorenzo, directed at the king himself, echoed loud enough for them to hear. Cassius wished more than anything that they had not been close enough to hear at all, but alas, there was no changing that reality. And before he could even react, Charlotte was on the move.

Rage boiled within him as the implications of Lorenzo’s accusations towards King Edin fully set into his chest. The thought of that disgusting, poor excuse for a sovereign putting his hands on his Lottie made his skin crawl, his heart drop, and his eyes harden like those of a devil as he stepped in stride with her as she approached them.

And there it was...The violence in Cassius that he had so hoped to leave behind was on full display in his mind’s eye as visions of a thousand ways to kill a king flashed through him. He would not let the man touch her. He could not. His fist clenched so tightly at his side that blood was almost drawn from his palm, the pain of it standing as one of the only things grounding him in the moment. Cas’s gaze was locked onto the face of their vile king as he struggled to see anything but the slick red of rage that threatened to consume him as they moved. Cassius wasn’t sure what was about to happen, nor if this would all escalate into something violent… But he was at Charlotte’s side and would remain so no matter the outcome.

Gods help them all.

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Location: Grand Ballroom
Time: Evening
Interactions: Olivia @potter, Charlotte @princess
Mentions: Kazumin @samreaper
Outfit: Bro Be Looking SO DAMN GOOD oh maw gawd

---

“Oh yes… I’m feeling quite lovely, actually.”

Cassius wanted to believe her.

Gods, he wanted to believe her so badly that the wanting itself almost felt like an act of faith from a faithless man. Charlotte stood there with bread in her hand and starlight on her dress, smiling as if the answer should have been simple, as if lovely was the truth. She leaned there with all the soft composure of a woman enjoying her evening. He had done it himself often enough to recognize the shape of it on another face, even one as beautiful and beloved and impossible as hers.

Yet there was something different about her tonight that made the word settle wrong in him. It was not only the gown, though gods knew the gown was making a valiant attempt to ruin every last shred of composure he had ever pretended to possess. It was the absence of ribbons, the wine-dark curve of her mouth, the way her eyes met his without darting away quickly like they sometimes did when she was feeling timid, the way she had crossed the ballroom and touched him as though she wanted people there to feel as though he belonged to her. It was all stunning. It was everything some foolish, greedy part of him wanted for her. But there was a brightness to it that frightened him too, a shine too close to flame. That fire had always been there, but what caused it to come to such a blaze tonight?

"If this is about the dress, I only thought it rude not to dress on theme," she added, and the soft giggle that followed was so perfectly Charlotte that Cassius almost abandoned his concern out of convenience.

But he could not.

His mouth curved into that patented smile of his, because that was all his mouth knew how to do when his heart was busy making a mess of itself. “Ah, I see.” His gaze moved over her again despite his better judgment, not with the earlier stunned hunger that had nearly left him useless, but with something a bit more careful now. “Well if the theme was to show up an entire room of people who live for the type of entrance you just had… Then I would say you nailed it.”

It was a flirtation, because of course it was. It was easier to be charming than frightened, easier to let his words wear a smile while the rest of him took inventory of every troubling little detail. Charlotte took her tidy bite of bread, and Cassius watched the small, ordinary motion with an ache he could not name. It had to do with the fact that she should have been allowed ordinary things. Bread and music and soft laughter with a friend. A night where a dress was only a dress and a ballroom was only a ballroom, but after everything they had discovered about one another of the past few days... After everything he now knew she was facing, his heart broke with the knowledge that she wasn’t just a pretty girl in a stunning dress living her best life. She was coping with the weight of troubles on the horizon that no one should have to face. Especially her.

Why her?

Then she licked the butter from her finger, and Cassius forgot, for one shamefully vivid second, that they were standing in public. His eyes caught on her mouth before he could stop them. On the dark wine of her lips. On the slow, careless sweep of her tongue against her skin. He wanted to look away but he did not...could not.

A dangerous heat moved through him, low and immediate, and Cassius had to tighten his hand around his glass to remind himself that there were people around them. And still, for one reckless heartbeat, all he could think was that he wanted that same careless mouth turned toward him.

Gods help him... His gaze lifted back to her eyes, slower than it should have, his smile crooked but no longer entirely safe.

She had to know what she was doing to him. And if she did not, that might be even more dangerous.

Then Charlotte’s attention drifted across the room, and Cassius saw the moment she noticed what everyone else had been trying very badly to pretend was not there.

“There’s a strange demeanor about everyone tonight, don’t you think? As if there’s a storm cloud looming over the room and nobody wishes to point it out.”

It was in that instant that he realized that she didn’t know about this morning… About the Queen and her execution.

She had been condemned at trial and made into a spectacle where most of the city had seen a woman’s flesh melt and ashes hit the ground just to come here tonight like none of it had happened, and somehow that seemed to be the way of things in Sorian. There was always enough bullshit to cover rot if one could afford to, and these fuckers could afford to. There always seemed to be enough music to drown out the sound of the screams of someone burning alive, always enough wine to turn a public execution into gossip by sundown.

And Charlotte did not know about what happened, that much was clear to him. Somehow, mercifully, impossibly, she had avoided the news. Cassius wondered if he should tell her before she found out in a worse way, but when he looked at her now, bright-eyed and glorious in whatever powerful confidence she had found, he could not bring himself to be the man who told her.

At least not yet.

His eyes flicked briefly to Olivia. It was just a glance, quick and quiet, carrying more of plea than command. His eyes begged Liv not to say anything either.

Thankfully her reaction to Kazu’s whimsical entrance shifted the topic.

“Oh—he’s spectacular,” she breathed, and Cassius let out a quiet, helpless breath of laughter.

“Spectacular is an understatement.” He jested as his eyes followed her delight for a moment before sliding toward Olivia, where a very different sort of spectacle seemed to be taking place.

Olivia had gone bright enough in the face that Cassius would have needed to be an idiot not to notice. Her hair made a poor hiding place, the food an even poorer one, and the bouncing of her leg practically announced that Kazumin had done more than entertain the ballroom.

Then Charlotte began asking Olivia about music, and for a moment the conversation felt truly normal. Do you dance as well? Sing? Play an instrument? Such simple questions yet refreshing giving the weight on his mind.

”Yeah… I played the violin for a bit with my mom but I did not sing.”

Cassius recognized what the woman was carrying in her eyes as she answered, and he looked down into his glass because staring at another person’s grief while it passed through them had always struck him as a particular sort of indecency. There was a mercy in pretending not to notice every second of it.

But the word mother had already gone through him.

Music always brought his mother back to him. That was the mercy and the cruelty of it. He did not first remember her illness…the coughing, nor the shrinking of her body, nor the way she had tried to smile through pain. It was her voice under open sky, her fingers moving over piano keys, her joy when she finally convinced him to sing along with her.

”Life is real fuckin boring without music, you’re right.”

Cassius smiled faintly, and this time the expression was not entirely a performance.

“My mother would have agreed with you.”

His gaze returned to Charlotte then, and softened more than he even realized as he wondered if maybe it was her he heard singing the other day outside his window. And then Charlotte looked back at him, and whatever fragile balance he had recovered began to slip.

“Are you alright, darling?” She asked him.

Darling.

The word settled into him with absurd force, slipping past what charm and armor he had left and sliding beneath all his practiced little ways of making himself untouchable. Cassius could have laughed from the sheer injustice of it. He had been stabbed, beaten, cursed at, literally cursed, desired, praised, hated, and called things far worse than Scourge in his time. None of it had undone him as efficiently as that one gentle word from Charlotte Vikena.

“You…” Her smile faltered, only slightly, and those honest blue eyes stayed on him with a care that made his defenses feel ridiculous. “…seemed a little… off, when I came over.”

Of course she would ask that. Of course she would walk into the ballroom transformed, dodge concern with buttered bread and pretty laughter, and then look at him as though he was the mystery worth solving. It was almost cruel, but it was even more humorous.

“I seemed off because you walked in looking like that, love.” he said, leaning just a little closer so the words belonged more to her than to anyone else. Before he could decide how much more truth to risk, Olivia struck directly at the elephant in the room with all the grace of a brick through stained glass. Cassius appreciated the bluntness.

"What the hell is going on with you?"

Cassius turned his head toward her, and for a moment he simply looked at Olivia with a kind of startled admiration. He set his glass down with care, moved closer to the both of them as he waited with bated breath to hear what Charlotte might say in response.

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Time: Evening of Ignis 10
Location: Danrose Castle
Interactions/Mentions: Marina @princess, Lucian @HylianRose, Mina @Tae, Nolan @Remram, Stratya @CitrusArms

The way Lord Nolan looked at Marina was respectful and full of admiration… Ambrose did not care for it. Not one bit.

There were many sensible reasons for that. The princess was young, the young lord was unfamiliar to him, compliments at court were rarely as harmless as they seemed, and any man who stumbled so openly over one could stumble over worse things if given the chance. It was Ambrose’s duty to notice such things. His duty was to measure the distance between admiration and intention. His duty to decide whether Lord Nolan Edwards was merely awkward, or a problem that required closer attention.

Those were all reasonable explanations as to why a knight in Ambrose’s shoes might feel negatively about the interaction… but they did not explain the way Ambrose’s jaw tightened when Marina’s cheeks warmed the way they did.

“I—yes. You too!” she replied to Nolan, far too quickly.

Ambrose’s eyes narrowed by the smallest degree. The response was ridiculous. Endearingly so, which only made it worse. But also, thankfully, his response was just subtle enough that perhaps no one even saw. Marina continued.

“I meant lovely back to you in a very manly and masculine way,” Marina informed him, hands settling on her hips as if posture alone could rescue dignity. “Obviously.”

Ambrose looked away before his expression betrayed him.

Absurd girl.

The thought came too fondly, and so he crushed it into something more acceptable.

Reckless princess.

There… that was better.

A few moments later, the lovely Captain Stratya Durmand approached. Ambrose noticed her before she arrived. There was purpose in her step, but also the warmth he had gotten to know from her. She came toward them dressed not as some delicate ornament of court, but as herself, and Ambrose found his attention settling on her with a steadiness he could not quite blame just on his duties to be vigilant.

The military dress suited her. Gods, it suited her in all of her glory.

Deep navy and rich burgundy, gold cord and polished buttons, medals glinting like small captured suns against the strength of her chest. A broad belt cinched her waist, emphasizing the hard-earned authority of her bearing rather than hiding it. The fur mantle over her shoulders somehow gave her silhouette a softness despite her formidable appearance.

But that was not all he noticed.

There was the brown tint of her hair, gathered with care but not tamed into lifeless perfection. The curve of her mouth, that suited both laughter and command. The kindness in her eyes... There was beauty in every inch of the ballroom tonight, arranged in silk, pearls, powder, and practiced poses.

Stratya’s beauty stood out to him in ways others could not. Her beauty was not artificial, nor was it performative or reliant on those very silks and gimmicks. It was natural, it was real, and she carried every bit of that beauty perfectly.

“Ambrrose,” she said, his name softened and reshaped by the rough music of her accent. “Would you dance with me?”

For a breath, Ambrose simply looked at her.

The offer was convenient. Mercifully so. It gave him a path out of the press of faces and feelings crowding him from every side. Away from Mina’s lowered gaze. Away from Lucian’s watching eyes. Away from Lord Nolan Edwards looking at Marina the way he had. Away from the tangled, ugly thing inside his chest that had begun the evening as duty and had since become something much less obedient. But her offer was not just merely convenient.

That was the problem.

He also wanted to accept. Not just because it would remove him from the group or because it allowed him to breathe. Not only because the dance floor would still keep Marina & her brother within view and within reach if danger came. No, it was more than that.

He wanted to accept because it was Stratya asking, and because a piece of him had craved her attention since his time with her and Marina at the shops.

His gaze flicked briefly to Marina out of instinct. Much to his chagrin, she was already watching. Of course she was. Marina missed a great deal and noticed far too much, often in the least convenient order possible. Her eyes held that bright, terrifying spark that meant a declaration was coming before wisdom could stop it.

“Okay! Ambrose, you are dismissed to the alluring, the darling, Captain Stratya!”

Ambrose closed his eyes for half a breath. Of course Marina would make a display of it all. Of course she would dismiss him in such a public way. Never subtle, the princess, at least not when he wanted her to be. But what she said…

Alluring. He opened his eyes again.

What she said had not been inaccurate at all.

“But now everyone’s eyes on Marnie, please!” Marina continued, pointing toward her own face with the full authority of a princess and the full dignity of a child demanding the stage at a family supper.

Ambrose allowed himself the smallest exhale through his nose and checked the room as Marina spoke. Lucian was close enough to Marina to serve her brotherly shield. Lord Nolan and Lord Drake stood near, more awkward than threatening. Mina was near enough to still be a wound to him, but her and Marina adored one another. There were guards posted at the edges of the ballroom, though Ambrose trusted his own eyes more than theirs. But there was no immediate threat, no insanely exposed angle he could not cross quickly from the dance floor if he had to.

He could step away. At the very least for one dance.

His gaze lingered on the princess for only a moment, as she wrapped Mina in her arms, before he forced it away. Lingering would do him no good, and Ambrose had already given enough of himself tonight to things that did not deserve to keep taking.

He turned back to Stratya.

“Captain Durmand.” His voice came out steadier than he felt. He inclined his head to her, formal enough for the room, but his eyes did not leave hers.

“If you are willing to risk your toes on a poor dancer like me, I would be honored.” The faintest dry edge of humor touched his words.

Then he offered her his gloved hand, his eyes softening in anticipation of her taking it.

“Shall we?”

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Location: Grand Ballroom
Time: Evening
Interactions: Olivia @potter, Charlotte @princess
Mentions: Kazumin @samreaper, Alexander Deacon @FunnyGuy
Outfit: Bro Be Looking SO DAMN GOOD oh maw gawd

---

”Just call me Liv, I don’t give a shit what title you give me.”

Cassius’s mouth quirked with appreciation for her bluntness.

“Liv it is then.” he replied, voice low with amusement. “And feel free to simply call me Cas. No lord, no Damien… Just Cas.”

Then she started eating, like really eating. Not the delicate little pecking that noblewomen did at events like this because they were scared to mess up their ridiculously over-caked makeup or get a little on their gowns. No, she was doing it right. Liv ate like a person who unfortunately knew what it was like to go without food at all, let alone the fancy little delicacies these peacocks left half-eaten on gilded plates. She appreciated every taste, every bite. That much was clear. And as a spectator, Cas fucking loved it too.

A laugh slipped out of him. Quiet at first, then warmer when she turned away with her cheeks full like a chipmunk. It was amazing.

”I'm sorry.. This food is really fucking good.”

“Do not apologize.” Cassius said casually with the faintest glimmer of genuine ease. “That may be the most honest thing that gets said in this entire ballroom tonight. Besides…” His eyes flicked briefly to the flock of nearby nobles pretending not to stare. “If anyone here judges you for enjoying food, I’ll take their plate as punishment and give it to you instead.” He offered a friendly wink to accompany his words.

Cas appreciated Liv’s presence. Especially there in that moment where her candor, and her lack of giving a fuck genuinely helped him feel more at ease. She had not come to him with a polished smile or some trite compliment or bullshit manipulative tactic like half of the people in the room would have. Instead, she simply came up, cursed, stuffed her face, and asked him how he was doing like she actually gave a damn about the answer.

”What about you - how are you? This is a lot for you isn't it?”

Cassius looked down at the glass in his hand. For a moment, he considered lying, but before he could even answer, the herald’s voice cut across the ballroom.

Lady Charlotte Vikena.

_{And as his eyes found her… the world changed forever.}

Cassius had always believed that romance novels existed as fairytales to push the naïve notion that love existed in some perfect way that could sweep someone off their feet and fix every single thing about the lives of the protagonists in the stories. It was escapism and that was all. Not unlike the ways he had always escaped from the world with the booze, the women, the men… and every other bit of beauty and pleasure he could find along the way. He knew escapism well, but his way had always been real whereas the books and stories that pushed such silly notions such as true love’s kiss had always been nothing more than fantasy for the innocent and the lonely. It was not real life, well… not until the moment she walked into the room.

The gold of the ballroom dulled, the painted stars on the ceiling above blurred, and the bodies between them, the gossip, the perfume, the bullshit beneath all that finery. It all fell away until there was only the woman stepping through the doors.

Charlotte.

Gods…Charlotte.

For one foolish second, Cassius forgot how to breathe.

He had seen her beautiful before, every single time his eyes had met her form she had been stunning. He had thought her beautiful in ribbons and plainer dresses, beautiful with grass beneath her and sunlight in her hair, beautiful soaked through and shaking by firelight, beautiful even when frightened, angry, exhausted, or trying desperately to hold herself together when everything around her seemed as though it were breaking piece by piece.

Her beauty had never needed adornment. It had lived in the melancholy of her eyes, in the careful way she held herself, in her kindness, the intelligence behind every witty little comment, and in the strange, lonely gravity that seemed to draw him to her no matter how many times he tried to step away.

But this was different.

Tonight, Charlotte Vikena did not enter like a girl hoping not to be noticed. She entered like the greatest secret the world had ever tried to keep. Cassius had seen the fire in her that very first night they met, but she might as well have been ablaze there at the front of the ballroom stealing the breaths and attention of all in attendance that evening. The mild mannered, sweet girl that deserved better than everyone in that room was there, center focus, and for a moment she owned them all.

Dark blue shimmered over her like midnight given shape, the gown catching the light in tiny flashes that made her seem less dressed in stars than made from them. Her hair fell in loose black waves down her back, elegant and deliberate, no ribbon binding her into softness. The deep wine of her lips made her face look sharper, more mature, almost…dangerous. The slit of her gown revealed the movement of her leg with each step, and Cassius hated every man in the room who noticed while knowing he was one of them.

But no… He was not like them. He was something else entirely.

They looked because they saw beauty and wanted a taste of it. They stared because they were shocked to see THIS Charlotte Vikena in front of them when they were used to another version of her.

Cassius looked like a man who had no other choice. He stared as though the goddess of his very salvation had just walked into the room…or perhaps the one who brought with her his doom.

Because there she was, in all of her fire and glory. Something in her had awakened, and it was magnificent.

But he also knew it was wrong. Something was wrong, and that was the part that tightened around his ribs.

There was power in the way she moved, yes. A devastating sort of power. Enough to make the air shift around her. Enough to make people turn with parted lips and startled eyes. Enough to make even his father look shocked across the room.

Cassius saw that.

He saw all the beauty at her disposal, the command she possessed in this moment. But he also saw the dark, glittering certainty of every step and the shadow beneath it all. He saw the girl from the lake clutching a wrapped book that she had been willing to die for. He heard her voice again, soft and dreadful by the fire.

I presume I’m on borrowed time anyway.

He saw the way she had leaned into his hand with tears threatening to break her apart. The way she had confessed to feeling helpless since seeing her mother’s body on the grass. The way she had spoken of witch hunters, the Black Rose, Alexander Deacon, and the terrible arithmetic of a girl who had somehow decided her life was the cheapest thing she could spend.

And now she walked through the ballroom like a woman who had made peace with becoming important…

The sight should have thrilled him.

And it did… Gods help him, it did.

It thrilled him so deeply that his chest ached with it. Pride sparked through him, bright and fierce, because some part of him wanted every person in that room to see what he saw. To see that Charlotte Vikena was not some poor, fragile thing to be pitied or judged in print and whispered over in corners. She was not a rumor, nor a scandal. She was not some tragic little line in a gossip sheet passed between the cruel hands of narcissists.

She was brilliant, and formidable, and she was so beautiful it hurt to look at her. And yet the hurt remained as he refused to look anywhere else. Not just because of how he felt about about this woman, but because Cassius could not tell whether he was watching Charlotte bloom or burn.

His fingers tightened around his glass.

“Oh fuck…” he breathed under his breath, too quietly for anyone but perhaps Liv to hear.

The words weren’t even meant to be spoken out loud, but he was a man ruined by what he saw. He was a man that, little did he know, would never live for himself again a day in his life.

Then Charlotte looked at him, and whatever remained of his composure abandoned him completely.

He knew that look. Or rather, he knew pieces of it. He knew the softness she tried to hide when they were alone. He knew the spark of amusement when she thought she had won some small witty battle of banter between them. He knew the guarded tenderness that frightened them both. But this was all of it made public, aimed at him without shame, without hesitation, without the careful little walls she so often placed between herself and the world.

She started toward him and Cassius straightened without meaning to. A man who had faced assassins, monsters, mercenaries, and the worst moral destruction of his own life suddenly had no idea what to do with his hands. He set his glass down so that he wouldn’t drop it. Then, he picked it back up because he was afraid he might need it.

“Gods.” he muttered, and for once there was no charm in it. No performance. Just a man quietly losing a battle he had not truly known he was fighting.

She closed the space like it belonged to her, and honestly…perhaps it did. Perhaps he did too.

“Hi, Cassius.”

There were a thousand things he could have said. Something clever, witty, flirtatious enough to make her blush. That was what he did, wasn’t it? Cassius Vael, Cassius Damien, whatever name the room wished to give him. He always had something to say. Always in control. Always on top or at least pretending to be. But around her, even in that first moment of their meeting, that all began to crumble. Tonight, it was the foundation of it all that gave way.

His mouth parted slightly, but whatever words had meant to form there seemed to die in quiet astonishment. She was close enough that he could see the details of her makeup, the dark blue of her eyes, the faint movement of her breath. Close enough that he could remember the taste of her mouth with cruel clarity. Close enough that every sensible thought in him scattered.

And then she reached up and her fingers brushed the corner of his lips.

Cassius went still. Utterly, painfully, absolutely still.

Because naturally, the woman who had just entered the ballroom looking like a moonlit omen had crossed the room to wipe a crumb from his mouth as if she had every right to touch him in front of gods, nobles, fathers, enemies, and anyone else who cared to witness his ruin.

His face warmed…and his cheeks turned red like some green boy receiving his first smile from a pretty girl at market. The horror of that realization almost saved him. Almost, but not quite, as he was barely human in that moment but at the same time more alive than he had ever been.

“Hi.” he finally managed.

One…Pathetic…Word.

He heard himself say it and immediately wanted to drown himself in the punch bowl. Cassius cleared his throat, the tips of his ears faintly red despite every effort of his body to pretend otherwise. His gaze flicked down to her hand, then back to her face, and the smile that formed on his mouth was helpless in a way he could not quite disguise.

“You…”

He stopped. His eyes moved over her again, not with the earlier hunger of a man who had forgotten his manners, but with reverence. With worry, and something tender enough to frighten him.

“You look…”

Beautiful was too small. It was not good enough. Ethereal sounded like something some perfumed poet would say, but even that word wasn’t worthy of her.

Cassius swallowed.

“You look…Perfect, Lottie." he said at last, voice quieter than usual, rougher too.

Then Charlotte turned to Liv, touching her cheek with such easy tenderness that Cassius’s chest gave another uncomfortable pull. The affection between them was gentle, but there was something about Charlotte’s openness that made him wary.

Not because he disliked it, but because he liked it too damn much.

He wanted her to feel powerful, wanted her to feel adored, to feel like the world could stare and she did not have to shrink like he had seen her do before. But he knew what had been happening beneath the surface.

He knew the book existed.

He knew some voice had called to her across the lake, and there was something in the way she stood tonight, something bright and dark and intoxicating, that made the memory of her shivering by the fire feel less like a past danger and more like a warning.

He wondered if Liv saw it too.

“You look so beautiful, Liv.” Charlotte complimented her friend.

”Oh! Um, me? Wow. Thank you.” The girl responded, almost as caught off guard as Cassius himself.

Cassius’s gaze flicked toward Liv, and despite everything, a softness touched his mouth. There was a sweetness in the way she stumbled over the compliment, a vulnerability he doubted she meant to reveal.

”You look beautiful too.” She responded. Soon though, Olivia spoke up with a question. ”Are you okay?”

There it was…The question Cassius had been too spellstruck to properly ask.

The question that had been pulsing beneath his ribs since the moment Charlotte entered. Liv glanced toward him, searching for an answer and Cassius did not have one. So, Cassius looked back at Charlotte instead. The softness in his expression lingered, but beneath it was the concern he could not fully hide. His voice, when he spoke, was low enough for only the three of them.

“Really, Lottie…Are you alr...”

And then, another loud introduction stopped his words in their tracks.

Mr Kazoo…the Skip Meister!

Cassius blinked as his gaze slowly shifted back towards the front of the room just in time to see Kazumin Nagasa descend into the ballroom with sunflowers in his hat and absolutely no concern for dignity, nobility, reputation, or any other bullshit most in this room coveted above all else. For a heartbeat, Cassius simply stared.

It was…a lot… especially moments after Charlotte had just changed his life forever in a way that he still hadn’t been able to process. But EVERYTHING about what Kazumin was doing was, in its own way, fucking perfect. Hilariously, ridiculously, wholesomely perfect. The whole display was a fever dream, one which Cassius could not help but enjoy. He smiled, genuinely smiled, as he watched the man dance, rejoice, and make a mockery of the formality of the entire evening in a way that he could not help but respect. There would come a time when Cassius would get the chance to talk to Kazu about all of it, but for the moment, his attention could only be won by the girl next to him. His eyes returned to Charlotte, and the humor softened back into the same concern he had before. Because not even Kazumin Nagasa, in all his bizarre and perfect glory, could hold Cassius’s gaze for long. Not tonight. Not when Charlotte was right there.

The room had many stars.

And Cassius had found his.

“Is everything alright, love?” He asked as his eyes studied hers for the same answers that Olivia had been searching for.

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Time: Evening of Ignis 10
Location: Danrose Castle
Interactions: Marina @princess, Lucian @HylianRose, Mina @Tae, Nolan @Remram

"Ambrose, thank you for getting her here safely as always."

Lucian’s words came out even and appreciative, but Ambrose was no fool. This man, this prince was doing his best to hide just how uncomfortable Ambrose’s presence made him, but his best… unfortunately for both of them… was not enough to conceal the discomfort fully.

“Of course, my Prince.” Ambrose replied with a similar tone. Despite the resentment that even now in this moment bubbled underneath, Ambrose could not deny the ping of melancholy that accompanied his anger when around the man he once felt so close to.

But that was before the prince had failed their beloved Sophia. Ambrose’s sister was gone, and fair or not it was Prince Lucian Camilia that had borne the weight of a brother’s rage in mourning. Ambrose’s even tone of voice as he answered the Prince did not disguise the look of contempt in his bronze eyes. He then turned to continue his vigilant observation of the room, leaving the siblings to talk as they may. As their voices lowered into whisper, the knight assumed the topic of conversation had switched to him, but it was not his place to know… Nor did knowing change the fact that despite his feelings, he was first and foremost there as their sworn protector. No amount of anger, no grudge nor animosity would see him falter in his mission.

Lost in his thoughts, but mostly in the task at hand to keep the siblings safe, Ambrose let the greater sounds of the ballroom fade and diminish into the background of his mind as he scanned the various people of the room with a knight’s acute awareness. As his watchful eyes were locked elsewhere in the room, he was completely caught off guard by the collision at his back. He turned defensively to face his collider, mind already considering potential conflicts, already switching into action. But what he saw, or rather who he saw once he turned only caught him off guard even more.

"Ambrose,"

Mina.

"I... I apologize. I wasn't looking where I was going. This crowd is... overwhelming."

Somehow, in his vigil, as he had let the sounds and voices of the nobility fade away, he had missed her introduction. Yet here she was, inches from him, when the last time the two had met eyes she was doing everything she could to pull away. Ambrose’s eyes took her in for the first time since the day she had broken his heart.

“Lady Blackwood…” He muttered, voice losing the knightly confidence that was usually on display. “I…” Ambrose began but stopped as he realized the woman could not look him in the eyes.

Had she been that ashamed of him? Was he such a loathsome thing to her that she could not even bear to look at him? There had been no real closure, no true healing of the wounds between them, yet he had not even realized to what degree until this very moment. It was as though he were back there in the instant of the very heartbreak itself. He looked to her here tonight, dressed in midnight blue and gold, the colors rich enough to make the candlelight linger on her. Silk clung close before falling away into a train, and golden roses had been worked into the vision of her like a declaration. Beautiful. Painfully so, but not peacefully beautiful. Not tonight.

Perhaps it was the way Lucian had been made so clearly uncomfortable by his presence staining his perception, but Mina’s own discomfort read to Ambrose as nothing but disgust for him. The wounds in his heart painted it as a hatred for him and how he would never have been good enough for her. The knight then watched those eyes of hers, the ones that could not fathom meeting his own, slip past him toward the very Prince he could not help but resent.

Lucian.

It lasted only a moment, and perhaps he imagined the way they softened. Perhaps not. Either way, the damage was done, and the fingers of his left hand twitched at his side as he swallowed down the feeling of seeing it in real time. That glance toward Lucian, brief as it may have been, was how those stormy-blue eyes once looked at Ambrose. For a moment, he was broken all over again.

“Do not worry, my lady… The fault was mine for being in your way.”

For the space of a breath, Ambrose was trapped there with her, with the scent of rosewater and silk, with the golden roses at her gown, with the taste of her still caught somewhere behind his tongue.

Then another voice entered the space between them. It was a mercy that Ambrose could only thank the gods for.

"Um, hello there. My apologies if we are interrupting."

Ambrose turned his head toward the speaker to see two young lords approach. The Edwards sons, if memory served. The knight said nothing. It was not his place to greet them before the royals had done so. Instead, he gave the pair a measured nod, enough to acknowledge their presence without surrendering his post.

The younger one continued, polite despite the obvious nerves.

"We offer our humblest greetings and respect to the royal family of Varian. My name is Nolan Edwards, youngest child of Duke and Duchess Edwards of Soralia, and this is my brother, Drake Edwards, eldest child and heir. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

Then Lord Nolan’s gaze shifted to Marina, and an entirely different emotion pinged inside of Ambrose. One he was not very fond of.

"It's great to see you again, Princess Camilla. You look..."

Ambrose watched the pause. It was small and harmless, perhaps, but his jaw clenched all the same as he watched the boy fawn over his princess. He wasn't sure exactly what brought about the physical reaction. With Mina's sudden arrival and the way it had frayed the threads of his composure, there was less clarity about his own thoughts and feelings than the man was used to. All he new is that something about it all made him tense.

"You look lovely tonight," Nolan managed, his smile warming with an honesty that made it worse. "Very lovely."

The young lord recovered quickly, or tried to at least.

"I, uh, I hope this night has found everyone well so far. Have you all been able to enjoy your stay in Caesonia?"

Ambrose folded his hands behind his back and let the royals answer, his expression settling back into the carved stillness expected of him. Though his eyes did shift briefly to Mina, and then to Lucian, and finally to Marnie as the knight forced his emotions down and wished to be anywhere in the world other than this room.

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Location: Grand Ballroom
Time: Evening
Interactions: Olivia @potter
Mentions: Lady Charlotte Vikena @princess, Alexander Deacon @FunnyGuy
Outfit: Bro Be Looking SO DAMN GOOD oh maw gawd

---

It was a room full of people pretending that they had not just watched a woman burn alive earlier that day.

It was a room full of people pretending to live their best lives, surrounded by all the glitz and glamour that Sorian had to offer. All that indulgence, all of that laughter, all of the pointless conversations and small talk that filled these noble endeavors. Like each and every one of them did have the ashes of the queen stained in their memory.

Cassius knew what it was like to be haunted by flames. This was not the first time he had watched skin melt from bone, nor was it the first time he had been cursed to smell charred hair and boiling blood. You would think knowing that the room is filled with others that may now be haunted the same would bring him some solace. It did not.

In fact, in that room filled with all of those people, Cassius may as well have been alone.

Lost in the labyrinth that was his mind, Cassius navigated the last week of his life. The memories started the night he pulled Charlotte from the depths of that frigid lake. The emotions of that evening had been overwhelming for them both. The push and pull of heart and mind, the revelations laid bare by her that night would have left anyone reeling. For Cassius, he had seen crazier, experienced wilder, and endured just as dangerous realities as the one she admitted to facing. And yet, none of the conflicts he had survived felt as real to him as the fear he suffered for knowing what she was going through. Each time he thought of her words his heart broke again. A Witch Blood. A target of a multi-fronted cast of villains, opposition that seemed hellbent on tormenting her, using her, or worse.

The witch hunters, if they truly knew about her lineage, terrified him. The Black Rose, whatever their machinations might be for her, terrified him. And his own blood boiled as he pictured the moment she described taking place at the art gallery; Alexander Deacon dominating her mind with his accursed powers… Attempting to force her to kiss him. Rage was not the word for how the act made Cassius feel. It was far too weak an emotion. What seared withing him was not just anger, it was hatred.

That hatred had reached his eyes, as his expression hardened and twisted into a wrathful stare down at the table as his grip tightened around his drink to the point where he could almost feel the glass shatter in his hands. He held it at bay and forced control over his outward presentation. Not revealing his cards in his face had always been a skill of his, but that skill had faltered lately. When it came to matters of Charlotte Vikena, his restraint, his composure, his devil may care disposition had all been compromised. As had his heart.

It was as though the control he had always possessed over himself had been taken from him. Not in a way like how Alexander manipulated his control at the banquet, nor how he tried to remove Charlotte’s control at the gallery, no… This was more like his own body surrendering the dominion he had over himself. It was not malignant, yet it terrified him all the same.

Every time Cassius and Charlotte had met up since that night brought with it that same fear. Fear for all she went through but also fear of what being around her did to him. Despite the heavy circumstances of their meetings, the harrowing conversations and revelations that came along the way… Each time they met, they somehow ended up tangled in one another’s arms. Despite themselves, their lips had found their way to one another on more than one occasion since that evening, but with every ounce of restraint either of them had that was all that had been allowed to happen.

And they never spoke of it. Not of the yearning of their bodies, nor the yearning of their hearts. They simply spoke of business. Charlotte went into details that she had not been able to that night. Details about what happened at the tavern, about how that filth had treated her and slammed her head into the table with such cruelty, details that added another man or two to the list of throats Cassius would gladly rip open if only the opportunity presented itself. In the case of the man from the tavern, work had already been done to find him.

Even Cas had opened up, telling Lottie about how he thought Kira had died, about the events that led up to his exit from the Iron Wolves, and how he knew deep down that they would come for him. Cassius revealed to her that he was not simply one of their best sellswords, but that they had been grooming him for command. The elders of the organization had chosen him to lead, and his exit had been more than a spit in their face. There would be a reckoning for that choice. Add it to the rest of the reckonings waiting around the corner for them both.

But what had stood out the most from all Charlotte had revealed that night was just how clearly she felt no one would miss her if she was gone. None of the dangers, none of the revelations had left him more shaken than those words.

Yet what had shattered him even more was the moment his father handed him the paper that morning. The words he read there nearly destroyed him.

“The woman is unhinged, son. She is not well. Do you see now why I…”

Cassius had tuned the rest out. It was all he could do in that moment to avoid wrapping his hands around his own father’s throat for speaking of her that way. Instead, those hands clenched it fists so tight at his side that his own nail dug into his palms deep enough to draw blood. The small wounds were still tender beneath his gloves as he stood here in this ball. And even now, as the thought passed through his mind of how Charlotte must have felt if the gossip was true, the corners of his eyes welled up with tears. Not just out of sadness for Lottie, but out of rage for whoever printed these words. True or not, for the words to be spread at all in such a public display of disgrace was disgusting.

Before his mind could turn to violence, a woman’s approach ripped him from his thoughts and forced him back into the reality of the moment.

“You look like you need a pick me up…Mind if I join? I can fuck off if you want.”

It was Olivia… Thank the gods. Cassius wasn’t sure if he could handle one of the polished, perfumed little parasites that pretended to be more important than everyone else just because of the status of their birth. Olivia was different, cut from a cloth that was much more familiar to him.

Cassius took in the sight of her. Ms. Hawthorne’s deep emerald gown was beautiful to say the least, but the woman within it was clearly uncomfortable wearing it despite how flattering the dress truly was. Clocking that actually brought the faintest of smirks to his face.

“No need to fuck off… I’m just glad its you and not one of those vultures.” Cassius jested, motioning to the majority of the room. “But how are Ms. Hawthorne? Or, Lady Hawthorne? I…I’m not sure I know which to use to be honest.” Cassius admitted, a puzzled expression on his has as he realized that her nobility, or lack thereof, had ever come up as far as he can remember.

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

---

Bastion

Race: Warforged
Class: Guardian
Location: The Kraken's Wake  Seadragon Keep
Mentions: Phia @princess, Arya @potter, Corin @Lava Alckon, Minerva / Malik@FunnyGuy, Meiyu @Tae
Equipment:

equipment

☼ Tower Shield
☼ Greatsword made of Glacium (A material as hard as steel, yet formed from eternally frozen ice.)
☼ Titan Chain – A reinforced tow chain housed in his left palm, functioning as a powerful grappling hook.
☼ Aged Leather Satchel
☼ Worn but cherished scarf
☼ Maintenance Kit .
☼ Heavy-duty rations (for companions, not himself).
☼ A delicate glass figurine of a bird—an old keepsake.
☼ A locked, timeworn journal—contents unknown.

Attire:
☼ Etched and weathered ivory metal plating with bronze accents.
☼ Fitted harness for carrying supplies.
☼ Worn scarf
Gold Balance: 37 gold
Injuries:
☼ Left shoulder was injured in the battle and is still leaking fluid.

---

Bastion did not sleep.

This was not a matter of discipline, nor pride, nor some noble thing like heroism. Sleep simply did not come for him the way it did for others. Their bodies surrendered to it, each in their own fashion whether it be uneasy or welcomed. Their minds and bodies required rest. His did too, but just not in the same ways.

For Bastion, there was only the rest of stillness. Hours and hours of quiet and still that was only interrupted by the occasional patron coming or going from their room, in which they had to awkwardly step over Bastion’s massive legs as he waved up to them from his place on the ground, and of course the sounds that boomed from below as even though many were sleeping by this hour… The Kraken’s Wake, much like him, itself never slept.

Morning crept in without ceremony, gray and pale through the warped windows, sunlight spilling across the hallway in thin pieces that slowly touched his legs, his hands, the old plates and seams of his body. Doors began to open and voices emerged, some quiet, some strained, some still intoxicated from the evening’s libations.

Bastion rose when the others did, and he was excited when he felt the door from Phia’s room open behind his back. As he stood it was obvious that there was always a weight to him when he moved, a carefulness, as if every step required calculation before committing to it. The last thing he needed was another incident like with the chair the night before… Though it did seem to make everyone happy. Well, everyone except for Minerva.

He gave Phia space when she came out, his gaze touching her briefly, checking for injury, distress, anything immediate or requiring action. Then that same curious gaze passed to Menzai, then Corin, then Arya, then Meiyu.

Then to a stranger.

There was not a Minerva in sight. This form was different. Height, face, frame, hair, posture, clothing, all different from her. Yet how could it be that this man was in the room and Minerva was not, when Bastion had taken vigil outside of the door all night. No one had gotten in or out without him knowing. His head tilted like that of a confused dog as he pondered, but no one else acted as though there was a problem, which only confused him even more.

Thankfully it wasn’t long until he was introduced to Malik, and though the interaction did not answer all of his questions, it did alleviate some of his concern. At the very least, he did not have long to react at all since by the time the group arrived downstairs, Beckett and the other pirates came to collect them.

A brief time later, they were in the depths of Seadragon Keep receiving introductions by a blue prince that looked more like a child to Bastion. The child prince called them property… He did not appreciate that. The child prince insinuated that their survival was now dependent on their submission to him… He did not appreciate that either.

Bastion watched as, one by one, the group began to introduce themselves. Malik started things off as though he Was their leader. The Warforged’s head tilted once more with curiosity towards the Elf. Not only because of the obvious confusion, but also because in some ways the man reminded him of someone. He pulled memories of a Valenar champion of the Tairnadal with which he once served. Painful memories… And thus he pushed them from his mind almost as quickly as they came.

Next was Phia, and the way she carried herself made him feel proud to know her, despite it only being for a brief time. When she struck her staff against the floor, Bastion could feel the vibration of its echo through the soles of his metal plated feet. She made her stance known, made it clear that she was not property, and she carried a presence with her that he had not seen from the kind girl before.

Corin stepped up to make introductions next. The man, in all of his honor, was defiant in his own way. His competence was put on full display, as was his confidence in his abilities. He gave only his title; The Gem Knight. Bastion wondered why, but something in his own depths understood the choice even if his mind had not fully processed it as of yet.

It was then that Arya moved to step forward, but she did not make it far. Her body trembled, slight enough that perhaps others missed it, but Bastion did not. Her hand remained near her bow. Her hood hid much, but not all of her face. Stella was tucked away close, quiet as a secret. Even now, he admired the creatures majesty and beauty. Arya’s gaze did not settle. It flickered, retreated, returned, then vanished somewhere inward.

Bastion did not know everything. He did not know the shape of the chains that had left their memory around her wrists. He did not know why some silences were chosen and others were endured. But for all he did not know, he did in fact know fear.

But a shield did not need to understand the entire battlefield to know when to interpose, so Bastion stepped forward without even thinking.

As he took his place where the others had stood, Bastion gazed upon Prince Dane the way he once gazed upwards at the very Queen of Cyre. Even Warforged could experience nostalgia.

“The designation that was given to me upon my creation is Bastion.” He divulged. “I was once a guardian of Cyre, but now my shield has been sworn to these people here. I am their defender. I have vowed to protect them. If you wish to harm them, I fear I will be forced to add more bones to the collection in this room. For almost 100 years I lived a life consumed by war. I wish for something different, but I will not be your property, child, and you will not bring harm to my companions… Or war it shall be again.”

Bastion did not wait for a response, turning an about face like he once did in formation as a soldier, and taking his place between Phia and Arya once more.

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

FLASHBACK

Cassius & Charlotte

_{Ignis 5th - ~3am}

---

Lover’s Lake had been the closest thing to peace Cassius had found since arriving in this cursed city. He had thought such peace awaited him at the taverns and brothels that littered its streets, but not even the pleasures he had always enjoyed felt the same here. Nothing felt the same here.


So instead, he found himself seeking something that he had often previously avoided… Silence. A place where the wind breezed through the trees and the steady pull of a fishing line asked nothing of him beyond patience. He had spent most of the day there with mud on his boots and the lake at his feet, a rod in hand and doing his damnedest to forget it all for a bloody while. But of course, his thoughts often had a way of drifting in the quiet moments, and so his resistance was as futile as it was anything else. And every path, every thought, every synapse led back to her... To Charlotte.

It was always her as of late. Nothing had infected his mind the way she had. Not his guilt, not his mistakes or his arrogance nor his desires. It was unlike anything he had ever experienced, and given just how much he had experienced in his 27 years of life, that said a lot.


He had tried, in recent days, to call it what it was not. A passing fixation, perhaps just misplaced tenderness. Bad timing wrapped in a pretty face and a pair of tragic, melancholy eyes. Yet none of those explanations held for long, not when he thought of the way she looked that day lying in the grass, and not when he remembered the sound of her voice that night when he took her on the date of a lifetime… And not when every attempt to leave her be seemed only to return him to her in some form or another, whether by chance or by whatever cruel sense of humor the gods had chosen to develop at his expense. He was haunted by her presence even when she was nowhere to be found.


The pathways of his thoughts then took a detour to the other woman who had been haunting him; Kira Mapenzi. The woman that had left him in a puddle of his own blood only days ago.


He had buried that old friend in his mind. He had watched her die… Or so he thought. And now, she had returned not just as a memory of one of his greatest failings, but as a blade burying into him and tearing open a wound deeper than the three in his side. The ghost he had mourned had become a living torment, and in Sorian of all damned places, where he had come seeking distance from the weight of his mercenary past, she had been waiting to bring her vengeance to his doorstep.


The very thought of that doorstep shifted his thoughts again. This time to his family. To the Damiens. His father, Liliane, his sisters….. Cassius still had not decided if the generosity of them opening their doors to him felt more like grace or strategy. Unfortunately, it was probably some fucked up blend of the two. That was the worst part if he was being entirely honest to himself. A man who made a living off of reading others to finish any and every job placed in front of him, yet he felt unequipped to piece together this particular puzzle. It made gratitude difficult. Not impossible, but oh so much more difficult than he could have expected.


The sound of fish jumping brought his thoughts back to the present. They had been biting well enough that afternoon to spare him from drowning entirely in his own head. By the time the sun had begun to sink and the sky dimmed to bruised gold, he had enough of them slung together to justify the hours spent out there, and so he had made his way back toward the Damien family cabin, which greeted him with even more stillness. Cassius had cleaned the fish on the porch, cooked them over the modest kitchen flame with a little butter and whatever seasoning had been left behind, and eaten at the small table with his sleeves rolled and the windows cracked so the evening air could move through the room.


Over time, that wind had begun to rise. Not all at once, but in increments, each gust a little sharper than the last. The trees stirred first, then bent, and somewhere in the deepening dark the first low growl of thunder rolled across the lake. Cassius had glanced up from his plate then, listening, and by the time he had swallowed the last bite the storm had already begun to gather itself in earnest and rain came hard.


It struck the roof in sheets and lashed the windows in sudden bursts, and lightning began to flicker across the water in crooked veins of silver-white. The whole world outside the cabin turned black over the course of just a short while as the storm fully picked up.


There would be no heading back into town tonight. So Cassius banked the fire, locked the door, and decided to stay. He tried to sleep. Gods, he did. He stripped down to shirt and trousers, laid out atop the bed with one arm flung over the side, and listened to the storm while his own mind, as often was the case, proved to be his greatest enemy. And even when he did drift off, the darkness behind his eyes was not empty for long as the dreams came. He saw the banquet hall again. He heard the music, smelled the perfume, tasted her kiss that lingered on his lips that night.


Then his mind went backwards in time to earlier that night. To Milo St. Claire. The artist had looked him dead in the eyes and called him the Scourge of Eisenholm. Now in the dream, just like he had been that night, his mind was transferred to the fire that consumed timber and flesh alike. The screams. The smoke. The impossible responsibility of making a choice that ruined parts of him that may never heal… A choice that no one in the world but him had to live with. He had come to Sorian in part because he thought he could outrun that name here.
Perhaps he thought he could stand beside his father, take this strange new place in this strange new family, and let the old horrors of mercenary life rot where they belonged.


Instead, he was beginning to understand that he had not escaped war at all. He had merely stepped into another one. A particularly loud crack of thunder pulled him from the dream as his eyes opened to the darkness of the room. Cassius sat up with a curse and swung his legs over the edge of the bed.


Cassius rose, relit the fire, and fed it until the hearth breathed warm gold into the room once more. Then he poured himself a generous glass of whiskey as he looked out the window. He stood there a long while, broad shoulders braced against a window frame, watching rain slash across the lake in silver streaks whenever lightning lit up the world enough to reveal it. The water had gone black, restless and heaving beneath the sky, and every time the light came it seemed to show the landscape in pieces only.


Then one flash came and something in the middle distance snagged at him. Was that…a person?


Cassius narrowed his eyes and leaned closer to the glass. For a second he thought it might have been driftwood caught wrong in the waves, or one of the storm-bent branches rolling in the dark water, or simply his own tired mind playing tricks on him. He might have let himself believe that if not for the second flash.


This time there was no mistaking it. There was a woman out there in the water, and she was struggling. She was fighting for her life.


Cassius was moving before the thought had fully formed and he was out of the room in three strides, wrenching the door open so hard it slammed against the wall, cold rain and terrible wind crashing into him all at once as he ran as fast as he could for shore.


Another flash revealed another glimpse of movement as he hit the shoreline at full speed and did not pause long enough to think about the water before charging straight into it.


Gods was it cold. Freezing, even. It hit his knees, his thighs, his waist, then his chest, and he drove forward through all of it until the lake took his weight from him and he started to swim with all of his might. Cassius struck out hard into the black water, each stroke a battle against the current and cold and the sheer madness of doing this in the middle of a pitch black storm in the middle of the gods' forsaken night.


For a few terrible seconds, he lost her. The lake was too wide, the rain too heavy, and the quick bursts of lightning gave him only broken fragments to work from. He turned, treading water hard, scanning, listening for any signs of life among the storm. Then he heard it, the sound of a desperate struggle. Cassius angled toward it immediately, teeth clenched against the cold. Another flash lit the lake and there, just ahead, he saw the shape of an arm striking wildly at the surface before disappearing again into the dark. He lunged the last few feet, and his lucky hands caught fabric first, then an arm slick and freezing beneath his grip. The body before him jolted at the contact, but there was no choice here. Cassius wrapped both arms around her, one braced under her shoulders, the other locked around her middle to keep her head above the surface as she struggled.


The swim back was even worse than getting to her. With every kick as he swam desperately for shore, the lake seemed to drag at them, to pull them sideways, down, anywhere but shore, and the weight in his arms was no dead thing but a living, panicked being that made the work harder and more perilous. Cassius forced his body through it all on fury and instinct, breath coming harsh and raw, shoulders burning, muscles beginning to scream from the cold. More than once a wave slapped over them both and he nearly lost his grip. More than once he thought the dark had swallowed all sense of direction and that he might be hauling them in circles toward death.


Then his knee struck stone and he crawled them both to shore.


He staggered up on numb legs, nearly collapsing from the relief of it, and dragged them both through the shallows until he could get purchase enough to lift more than pull. Wet sand and scattered rock dug cruelly into his knees as he lowered her down at last upon the narrow stretch of shoreline, both of them gasping, the storm still battering down around them without mercy.


For several seconds, Cassius could do nothing but breathe.


His whole body stung with cold. Water poured from his hair and clothes. His lungs felt flayed raw from effort and freezing air. One hand braced in the stones beside her while the other hovered half uselessly at her shoulder as he tried to offer what assurance was possible in such a grave moment.


Lightning flashed again, and in that bright instant, he finally saw the face of the drowning woman.


Cassius froze.


For a heartbeat the whole storm seemed to fall away from him, every other thought torn clean out of his head by the sheer, impossible absurdity of what the night had placed in his arms. Wet black hair clung to her skin. Her mouth was parted as she gasped her ragged breaths. Her nightgown was soaked through, pale fabric plastered to shaking limbs, and strapped tight against her was something wrapped and held close even now as though some desperate part of her had refused to let it go.


How could it be her? Why, of all people, would Charlotte Vikena’s terrified face be staring back at him here and now as she was moments from death.


His chest rose and fell once, hard as his rising heartbeat forced him to regain his senses. Then he leaned over her, rain streaking from his brow to his jaw, storm-gray eyes wide with shock and terror of his own.


Charlotte flinched hard the moment arms had closed around her—She could feel the hold around her torso, but in that instant her mind refused to process that this was a rescue; all it could process was restraint and a familiar sense of helplessness. And she couldn’t see. Her vision was a blur of darkness and movement. Distress contorted her features as her mind cruelly conjured the sight of a bright light above the surface of the water, shapes hovering above her, their bodies reduced to silhouettes. Her mouth opened on a panicked breath, but it came out as a choked sound instead.

“Charlotte?” He asked, panting and afraid.

Her head jerked weakly, her eyes unfocused. “N-no-” she spluttered, coughing hard. “Don’t-please-”

“Hey…hey, you’re safe now Lottie. It’s okay, it’s all going to be okay.” He managed through heavy breaths. “It’s Cassius.”

After another cough, she blinked hard as if that would force her vision to work properly. Her gaze flicked past him, pupils darting about in search of the bright light her mind insisted was hovering above her. But she only saw a smeared mess of darkness, rain and moonlight.

Her vision snapped back to him again and his features began to take shape before her.

Her hands twitched against his sleeves as she stared up at him, trembling and slowly registering her surroundings. She swallowed and when she finally managed to speak her voice was quiet as she met his gray eyes.

“How do we keep ending up back here?”

His head shook slowly as a relieved, but mischievous smile began to form across his lips.

“Honestly… your guess is as good as mine, princess.” His words were laced with levity, and yet they still carried a natural concern as he spoke. “But I’m just glad I saw you. I… I don’t know what would have happened if I hadn’t.” The humor in his expression faded a bit, replaced by the haunting reality of what could have been if he hadn’t been standing in that window when the flash of lightning revealed the person in the lake to him.

Charlotte stared up at him for a long moment, rain stinging her eyes. But as her vision cleared the smallest amount she caught a view of him that made the storm somehow seem distant. The moonlight broke through the storm clouds in a pale spill over them that framed his face and shoulders, turning the water on his skin to silver. She held on to that sight, blinking hard, letting it pull her back into herself one breath at a time.

Only once she truly understood the moment did she speak, leading with pride that had arrived like a reflex. “...Nothing,” she said finally, trying to push herself up as if she could prove herself with the movement, only to wobble immediately when her arm refused to cooperate. Her jaw tightened yet she lifted her chin anyway, stubborn to the bone. “I had it handled.”

Despite himself… Cassius scoffed with a bit of laughter.

“If your goal was to drown, perhaps I would agree. Otherwise, you most certainly, did not have anything “handled”, love.”

Watching as she wobbled, Cas reached to offer her a little assistance, only for her own stubbornness to pull through for her in the end. He remained close and looked her over for any obvious injuries as she pulled herself together. Besides a few scrapes, she was fine.

“If you repeat that to anyone,” Charlotte said, voice hoarse but stern, “I will deny it with such conviction that even you will start to question reality.”

“No worries, Lottie… Your messy little secret is safe with me.” Cassius bantered before letting the conversation take a slightly more serious turn. “But look, you are shivering and if you stay wet out here in the cold too long things can get dangerous. Allow me to get you inside so you can warm up. My family’s cabin is only a short walk away and there’s fire, and dry clothes, and you will be safe there.”

She tensed and hesitated. There were a million and one reasons not to agree to that.

Yet she found herself nodding all the same.

Cassius sensed the trepidation and lowered himself to meet her gaze at eye level. The expression on his face was nothing but genuine, those storm-gray eyes of his carrying a kindness in them that stood true. With the curls of his soaked hair falling into his face, he looked softer to her than ever before.

“I promise, the only thing on my mind is making sure you are safe and sound. You have nothing to worry about.”

With that, the two were off and Cassius led Charlotte carefully back up the path toward his dwelling. In the dark of night it was difficult to see the structure until it was close enough to touch, and before long he was opening the door and welcoming her into the cabin where the two of them were met with the respite of the fire.

The cabin itself was not as ostentatious as one might have expected of something used by the Damiens, but it was warm and more than comfortable, and Cas welcomed such comfort after such a freezing cold plunge. He could not imagine how Charlotte was feeling about now, given that she was lighter than him and had been in the frigid waters far longer.

“Please, make yourself at home, Lottie. I think there are some clothes in the other room that had been set aside for Violet or Lily. I imagine they will suit you just fine for the night. Allow me to go grab them.”

Charlotte ended up near the fire more by stubbornness than anything, lowering herself onto a nearby chair with slow, careful movements that made her exhaustion impossible to hide. Her teeth chattered hard enough to hurt, and her hands trembled despite every attempt to steady them. Wet dark hair clung to her neck as she swallowed against the burn in her throat.

She fixed her gaze on the flames and the way they climbed over the bricks, as if staring at the fire could somehow make it more effective. Her fingers curled tight around the oilcloth-wrapped book in her lap as she shivered, lips still faintly blue in the firelight.

Cassius noticed the way she gripped the item, but his focus was elsewhere for the time being. He grabbed a fur from the back of the nearby couch and draped it over her to help with her chill. As he moved around to sit beside her next to the flames, he reached up to brush the wet hair from her face and tucked it behind her ear with one gentle motion.

“This will do for now, but getting into dry clothes would truly make a world of difference.” His eyes traveled to the soaked gown she wore, the way it clung to her and revealed sight of the flesh beneath caused his heartbeat to rise as though he had never seen the female form before. Doing his best impression of a gentleman, Cassius tore his eyes away from Charlotte’s body and brought them up to meet hers as they gazed into the fire. The woman had a way of making the debonair man he had become feel more like a nervous child without even trying, and that was far from the only effect her presence had on him.

“Give me a moment to warm my bones as well, and I can get some tea brewing for the both of us. Is there anything else you need, Lottie? Are you hurt anywhere?”

Charlotte had been about to nod as she met his gaze. Dry clothes sounded like heaven right now after all. But before she could agree to such a notion, she found herself watching those eyes of his, watching as they lingered just a little too long on her body. She didn’t speak, her heart racing in her chest in frantic bursts that had nothing to do with the cold. Her lips parted slightly before she could stop them… and before she could stop her thoughts. Her gaze held on his for a second, and then she drew the fur closer around her shoulders.

“N-nothing that needs fussing,” Charlotte managed finally. Her eyes flicked back to the fire, then returned to him with a pointed softness that was still guarded. “Just… Please don’t look at me like that,” she said quietly, pulling the fur tighter as if she wanted to hide inside it. “I’ve already suffered enough.” Those last words were barely audible.

“Apologies.” Cassius stated equally as quiet, and he meant it. Truly, he did, but he also saw the look in her eyes. He also witnessed the way her body reacted to his gaze; the way it made her feel before she had a chance to censor herself. They both felt it, and though the apology had come from his heart, his eyes did not match the tone. Something in the way she reacted only made those eyes of his hungrier.

Despite his mind’s protest, his gaze stayed locked on hers for a time, until he finally found the strength to once again force it away.

Cassius swallowed as he looked towards the quaint little kitchen, trying to fill his mind with thoughts of anything else but the images that her body’s reaction conjured in him.

“How about that tea?” He choked out, standing to move towards the kettle.

“Sounds swell.” Charlotte replied rather hastily, her eyes back on the dancing flames.

“Good.” Cassius said as he moved into the other room and toward a wardrobe. Then he yanked it open, and fumbled about until he plucked out a nightgown. Upon return, he tossed it toward her without looking at her directly. “Put that on before you freeze yourself.”

Charlotte caught it against her chest, her cheeks already warming. She slowly shifted on her palms with the intent to rise and change, then paused mid-motion.“ Ummm.. Please turn around.”

His brow lifted. “I am a gentleman.”

“Cassius.”

“Turning.” He obeyed at once, facing away with his hands lifted in surrender.

Behind him, there came the rustle of fabric that went on for perhaps longer than expected, followed by a frustrated breath. Charlotte managed the first sleeve, but when she tried to get her arm through the other one, her elbow buckled, her fingers slipping uselessly in the fabric as her exhaustion won the battle.

“...Lottie?”

“I am fine,” she lied breathlessly, and secretly mortified.

He turned just enough to look at the floor instead of her. “I’m coming over. I won’t look.”

“You had better not.”

“On what remains of my honor.”

He stepped behind her, keeping his eyes fixed over her shoulder as he took the loose fabric from her trembling hands. His fingers brushed her waist as he helped pull the gown properly into place, and the contact sent a shiver through them both. For one dangerous second, his hand lingered there, while his warm breath tickled the side of her neck.

Neither of them spoke.

Then Cassius swallowed hard and finally said, “There.” His hand fell away, though not as quickly as it should have. “Decent enough to survive tea.”

Once she was settled, Cassius finally gave himself permission to remember that he was still soaked through as well. He disappeared only long enough to drag on dry trousers and a loose shirt from the wardrobe, returning with damp curls, bare feet, and a gentle smile as made his way into the kitchen.

And for a time, there was silence as Cassius prepared the tea. He could not help but smile in frustration at himself for his own weakness. Never had he felt such lack of control, such desire for one single thing. He was a man who sought it all, who wanted everything, who did as he pleased as often as his life allowed. But here, tonight, it wasn’t everything he wanted…

Just then, the kettle sang and Cassius poured them each a cup, grabbed the cream and sugar from the table, and returned to her with warmth in hand. He passed her the cup he had prepared her, and took a long, slow sip of his own.

“So…” He said coyly. “Do I get to know why in the hells you were out there…doing whatever the fuck it was you were trying to do, or must I just use my imagination?”

“If you are hoping for a sensible explanation,” Charlotte began quietly, not quite looking at him, “I am afraid I cannot offer you one that will make you feel satisfied.”

She swallowed once, throat still raw, then continued. “I could not sleep,” she admitted carefully, “Every time I closed my eyes, it was dreadful, and I went looking for air.”

Charlotte then hesitated, frustration flickering across her face like she was angry at herself for not having a better answer. “Somewhere between my door and the lake, I stopped thinking like a person with sense,” Charlotte told him. “I do not know why I went there. I only know that once I was standing at the waterline, it felt impossible to turn back.”

Her gaze finally shifted to him, as if she was asking him not to make her say it twice. “And I am aware that sounds mad,” she added, “But it is the truth.”

“Well… In my experience, it is often the case that the truth is one form of madness or another.” He replied without condemnation. “I do not wish to lecture you, I am not here to judge you, Lottie, but all the same I must express how dangerous it was to end up in that water. It was reckless, and this is not the first time I have watched you act in such a way. If there is more to this story…” Cassius let his eyes dip to the thing wrapped in cloth that she clutched so tightly in her hands. “If there is more to that, and you need someone to listen. I am here.”

“You’re right,” Charlotte admitted quietly, and there was no attempt to sound clever about it. “It was reckless.” She chewed the inside of her cheek as she tried to decide if there was anything more she wanted to tell him, just as he had offered. Perhaps she could even go with a safer option, but the truth arrived first. “It probably doesn’t matter much… not to say I’m ungrateful for your rescue,” she added quickly, voice thinning, “it’s just… I presume I’m on borrowed time anyway.”

Her words, heavy as they were, made his eyes fall to the floor. A cocktail of thoughts and emotions passed through him, summoning words of encouragement that he wanted to offer, any form of reassurance that he could muster, but like with her… it was his truth that came out first.

“Love, we’re all on borrowed time. That doesn’t make you special.” His eyes lifted to meet hers again as he finished his words.

Charlotte’s mouth parted as if she might argue, but instead she pushed the details deeper in the dirt. “I beg your pardon,” she huffed softly, “I was assured from birth that I am the most special creation in Veirmont. My papa said so, and he was never wrong about anything in his own mind.” She then took a long sip of her tea as if that could mend her somehow. After a pause, she asked, “So why are you out here anyway?”

And there it was, the cause and effect of his long learned… and even longer practiced defense mechanisms.

He had spoken the truth, but it was the wrong piece of the truth. All his words did was push away, and he could see it as clear as anything. He sighed at her response, not with frustration towards her but with disappointment in himself. What he had not shown her, what he did know how to show at all, was just how shattered he had been the moment he realized it was her in that water. She had no idea what seeing her there that close to death had done to him. Charlotte could not know the effect her recklessness had on him… Because he had no idea how to show her.

Decades of deflection, of holding it all together despite the circumstances in front of him had prepared him to be strong, but nothing in his life had prepared him for Charlotte or his feelings for her that were beginning to consume him. This wasn’t the first time she had broken the man who had always seemed unbreakable, and never once had she even tried to. But he had been broken by the sight of her struggling for her life all the same.

Cassius ignored her question, and his expression did not soften to her humor. Instead, his eyes held the fear of a child as his gaze was locked onto her. He placed his tea down and finally let the words slip that he tried his best to hold at bay.

“Charlotte… I… You… terrify me.” He said with absolute honesty. “This recklessness… It scares me.”

Charlotte’s gaze did not leave her tea as she watched the small rings ripple across the amber surface. She tightened her grip on the cup as his words truly reached her.

The first thing she saw was her mother’s face, so clearly twisted into terror that it made her stomach turn. She watched her lips move, yet heard nothing. Somehow that made it worse. The imagery itself felt so far away that she could not tell if it had crawled up from the recesses of memory, or if she had invented it just to punish herself, but she still knew the words without needing to hear them.

You’re a monster.

Either way, she knew in her bones that Cassius was not the first person she had frightened.

But this was for a different reason. He was not frightened of her the way her mother had been, and as her brows knit and blurry fragments surfaced of a frightened young blonde, she realized he was not afraid of her the way Princess Anastasia Danrose had been either. Her mother and Anastasia had looked at her the same way her grandfather had once looked upon a young Walter in that church, like she was something that could ruin them.

But when Charlotte finally raised her gaze and met the gray eyes of the man who had plagued her dreams, she knew before she had even registered all his words that this was different. The look in his eyes was too familiar, the kind she saw late at night when she caught herself in the mirror, trying not to fall apart…

…And afraid to lose someone again.

And deep down, perhaps the exhausted girl understood exactly what that meant. But all the same, all she could muster was the same old question: “Why?”

“Because what happens if I’m not there to follow you into the next burning building, or pull you out of the freezing waves? My father tells me to stay away from you… You ask me to leave you alone… But what if I do? Where would all of this lead you?” His hands moved to brush his fingers through the wet curls that were now falling into his face. Those same hands were shaking as they returned to his side.

Charlotte did not answer him. Her lashes fluttered once as if she were trying to clear the sting from her eyes, but the wetness clung anyway. She kept staring, her mouth parted, the tremble in betraying her answer.

“Does no one else see this? Do your friends not see the negligence you have for yourself? Is no one else paying attention to whatever it is that you are carrying behind those eyes, Charlotte?” He paused just long enough to steady his breathing as it was beginning to slip out of control. “Is there no one that knows what you are dealing with? I don’t know what’s under that cloth, but the way you held onto it for dear life tells me that it’s something you were willing to die for. What is it, Charlotte? What has you so willing to throw away your own life?” A quivering hand rose once more and found its rest upon her cheek.

Her lashes trembled as she shut her eyes and leaned into his hand, focusing on the heat for a moment, but even the press of his skin could not stop the subtle movement of his fingers against her cheek. It was not her shaking she felt. It was his.

“I…” Her lips pressed together as her expression threatened to fall apart, as if she were going to fall into his grasp and cry. Maybe she even wanted to. But she didn’t. She opened her eyes instead, and after a hard swallow, she told him simply, “I’m a witchblood.”

She dug her fingers into her knees. She pulled herself backward a touch, her cheek leaving the warmth of his skin. “And they know I am,” Charlotte added, her voice quieter now. She didn’t bother elaborating who; surely Cassius was well aware of the kingdom’s latest antics.

Her gaze then drifted away, afraid he would look at her with fear in that other way. “And if they don’t claim my life first, then the Black Rose will,” she continued, jaw setting as she forced the words through. “Even Alexander Deacon himself didn’t sugarcoat their current feelings about me.” She hadn’t been afraid of losing her life, not since the night of the tavern, but saying it out loud made holding herself together all the more difficult.

Charlotte nodded once as she repeated, “Borrowed time, Cassius… It’s the only time I have to make sure those I care about are safe.” Her fingers trailed over the wrapped book at her side, not offering it, only anchoring herself to the fact it was still there. “Perhaps I am reckless,” she finished, and her eyes flicked back to him, stubborn to the bone even now. “But forgive me if I would rather die trying.”

A few seconds passed between them as Cassius simply listened to her words, eyes darting from place to place as he processed the revelations and truths she laid bare before him. Just when the seconds began to feel like eternity, he responded.

“Is that all?” Cas asked with a forced semblance of humor; an offer of levity to lighten the weight he knew she must be feeling. The thumb that caressed her face stroked her cheek gently as he continued. “Good thing I already planned to kill Alexander Deacon and burn the Black Rose to the ground.” He declared simply but full of conviction.

“Cassius.” The pitched protest that left her lips had been a breath away from shrill.

“And once that problem is solved, we find a way to deal with the Hunters. Oh, and since we’re sharing… The Iron Wolves will be coming for me as well. They…well, let’s just say they aren’t pleased with the way I exited the organization. And of course, there’s my old pal Kira. I’m not sure if it’s connected, but she’s definitely looking for some kind of vengeance against yours truly.”

Finally, his eyes softened once more as he leaned closer and lowered his voice to a quiet hum. “There… You’ve shown me yours, and I’ve shown you mine in return. We’re complicit, guilty by association even. That means there’s no reason you shouldn’t let me help you. That’s all I ask of you, Charlotte… You don’t have to like me, you don’t even have to trust me, but please… don’t force me to watch you go through this alone.”

“Kira–The woman from the auction–.” Charlotte blinked rapidly as the information overwhelmed her, stacking much too fast to sort through quickly. Her teeth caught her lower lip as if that might steady her, and her eyes lingered on his, searching him as if she could find more context somewhere.

Slowly, her gaze softened, and her brows lifted. “You want… to help me?” She asked hesitantly, the surprise vivid in her tone. “... Have you lost your mind?” The voice that left Charlotte’s lips was small, despite the fact that the question had slipped out without her permission.

“I’ve lost a lot more than my mind, princess…” Cassius admitted with a broken smile. “But yes, I want to help you. And why not? Someone has to.”

Her hand instinctively lifted to settle upon the back of his, the very one that was laid upon her own cheek. Something about that smile had pulled at her heartstrings before she could process why she had even touched him… And something about it had also made her feel terrified to ask what he had meant. So instead, she asked a different question. “ … But then why did you take me to a club affiliated with the Black Rose? …Did you know?”

His eyes told the entire story, one piece at a time. First the confusion, then the shame, finally… Regret.

“No, I didn’t know. I’m sorry, Charlotte. The man who runs that club, his name is Luca… He and I have history. I thought I could trust him, and I was wrong. I should have known better, I should never have taken you there.” His eyes actually fell away from hers in contrition. “I just wanted that night to be special. I wanted it to be perfect, for you.”

“Oh…Very well.” She said softly, her shoulders slumping as she grew quiet. Her eyes averted his as a smile pulled at the corners of her lips. “... I’m sorry too… That I scratched you… I was hallucinating, and I saw, well, someone else. ”

“No… You don’t need to apologize for that. I, um, I knew it wasn’t really you. I didn’t blame you, I just… I didn’t understand why it hurt me the way it did. Not the wounds, I’ve had worse many times over, but something about it hurt in a way that I wasn’t prepared for. And let’s be honest, Lottie… I probably deserved it all things considered.”

“No, you did not.” Her reply came quickly and with certainty.

Though his instincts fought for him to break his eyes away from her gaze, his heart would not let them. Shame coursed through his entire being as he felt the full weight of all the decisions that haunted him. It was too much, all at once, for anyone to truly bear. Yet he endured. He always, somehow, endured.

“How I wish that were true.” Cassius confessed.

However, he did not give time to linger on his words. Instead, he kept the conversation moving forward.

“But enough about me, love. You still haven’t answered my question.” Cas reminded, only now letting his eyes slip from her gaze so that they can land upon the wrapped item she coveted. “Feel free to tell me to go fuck myself if you aren’t going to tell me what that is, but I am more than a little curious and though I do have a guess… I’d rather hear it from you.”

Her gaze softened as she stared at him, her hand hovering by his face still. Then, she shifted closer until her shoulder brushed his. It was not flirtation so much as instinct in the way she couldn’t help but be tender toward something wounded. She hesitantly but slowly rested her head on his arm as if the contact alone would communicate a quiet refusal to let him fight alone.

Then Charlotte drew in a breath before finally speaking, “I think it’s a magic book.” she admitted. “ I… It’s not like I departed my home in the middle of the night to hunt for it... “ Her eyes drifted once again to the book, and this time she picked it up and placed it on her lap, her palms flattening the cloth over the top. “More so, it felt as if resisting was impossible, “ she continued, voice almost apologetic, “I followed a voice I heard calling my name across the lake.”

After a pause, she added softly, “...I don’t think I want to open it yet.”

Cassius, despite how much that all was to take in, did not hesitate to respond.

“Magic books…Voices in your head leading you to strange places… Lottie, this is not a safe path you tread.” His hand, which had rested upon her cheek, moved to cradle her back as she rested her head against him. He paused just long enough for his next words to carry the weight intended for them. “If you ask me, which you haven’t, but still… I think you should burn it. Never open it, destroy it, leave the ashes behind, and walk away from this while you’re still standing on the ledge instead of taking the plunge and praying for a soft landing.” Slowly, his hand rose to stroke the back of her hair as he continued. “Fucking with magic, getting wrapped up in powers that were not meant to be comprehended… It never ends well. I promise you.”

Her shoulders slumped again; there was no way to sugar coat it, and she was too tired to pretend there was. So she told him the honest truth. “... I am well aware of how it may end for me.” And though such a notion frightened her, nothing was scarier than the other option, standing by and doing nothing while everyone she loved got dragged under. Cassius was a strong, skilled mercenary; a master of his craft. Meanwhile, no one expected Charlotte Vikena to hold her own. Even she didn’t.

A dozen rebuttals came to mind as Cassius lifted her chin to look at her, as did the logic and experience of a man who had lived a life of war. Even to one who had spent his years gallivanting, chasing glory and pleasures across the world, the price she spoke of was simply too high. There were so many options in front of them that did not require her to ever turn a single page of that book. He could train her in his art of protection. She, as one of the wealthiest women in the known world, could hire an army to fight her battles for her. Cassius had connections, ways of getting her and her family out of danger, but so much of that was made null and void by what was so clearly laid behind her eyes: Charlotte Vikena would do whatever needed to be done to protect the ones she loved, no matter the cost. What he saw in her eyes was a truth worth a thousand words; indisputable and unyielding despite how he wished it were not true.

To Charlotte, her own life was ancillary to the others she deemed worthy of her protection. He could tell she did not see the worth in herself, nor would she be able to put her own bleeding heart down long enough to run from this. And though he respected the hell out of her convictions… he feared them even more. But, instead of arguing… Instead of pushing his logic down her throat to futilely prove that there must be another way, all Cassius found himself capable of doing in that moment was the closest thing to begging he had perhaps ever done in his entire life.

“I don’t think you understand…” The words came out somber, with a shakiness that this time had nothing to do with the cold. “If all of this leads to that end… Do you not realize what it would do to those you are trying to protect? To those you love and that love you back. Do you not see how it would destroy them…how it would… destroy me?” The last words from his mouth were not part of his plan, but they may have also been the truest words Cassius had ever spoken.

His words repeated in Charlotte’s head only moments after he said them… over and over.

_{...how it would… destroy me…}

Her heart raced harder and harder the more she heard it. She stared at him for a long time, wondering if she had misheard him… But she was certain she had not.

Charlotte’s fingers tightened around her teacup. She watched the little rings skitter across the amber surface faster and faster with the tremor in her hand. So the first thing she did was set down the teacup on the side table as carefully as she could, and she returned to his position close to him, laying her head back the way she had.

“Cassius…” She heard herself say. It came out softer than she had initially intended and she swallowed. “I–” She swallowed hard, her leg bouncing with the motion of her foot. “I would never want to hurt anyone, least of all you… Truly, I’d never.” Those words were as sincere as could be. The very idea of hurting him was making her drown in anticipatory guilt. Her lashes fluttered as she tried to keep herself steady. “I simply… I never thought anyone would miss me in a way that mattered.”

Cassius’s hand flexed at her back, his eyes fixed on the fire as she spoke, but Charlotte felt what her words did to him in the change of the air between them.

The admission had made her eyes sting with tears. Charlotte had meant to stop there, but the dam had broken. “...Every time I do nothing, something keeps happening anyway,” she said, voice thinning quickly with every word.

“My friends get threatened, targeted, attacked—” Her jaw tightened. “I’ve thought of hiring people, but it feels like trying to fight something you cannot even point to. I don’t know where they are. I don’t know where to send anyone. I don’t even know if I’d be sending men to their deaths for the sake of my own panic.” Her voice grew shakier as she spoke. “Even Wulfric himself knows next to nothing. We’re trying to pull threads through audits and records because that is all we have.” Her eyes flicked back to him, glossy with the effort of not falling apart, but that look was enough to make him feel as though he might crumble then and there. “I have felt so completely helpless, Cassius…”

She then rose from her seat, pacing with her own anxious energy, “When a woman threw a knife at Lorenzo’s head, I did nothing,” she blurted, the words tumbling out as if they had been trapped behind her teeth. “When he disappears every night to Primitus knows where, I do nothing. When Kazumin found his garden desecrated with dolls of everyone he loves—guess what? I did nothing.” The hot tears started then, and she felt humiliated as they streamed down her cheeks, but there was no stopping them.

“When Lord Edwards was burned with a fire poker over and over, and I couldn’t do a damned thing but watch, I did nothing again.” Her voice cracked, and she turned her face away as if that could hide it. “Even when my head was slammed into a table, when a man tried to choke me, when Alexander Deacon—” Her breath caught on his name, anger and fear written all over her face. Meanwhile the mere mention of Alexander Deacon’s name had made Cassius’s body tense. But it wasn't until she finished the statement that his gaze had suddenly darkened. “—when he nearly made me kiss him with some sick sort of mind magic, I still did nothing to protect even myself.”

The hysterics finally faltered into a tone of pure exhaustion. “So I do what I can with what I have, and what I have is… not enough.” It was at that moment she found the nerve to look at him. “I have felt hopeless since I saw my mother’s body on the grass,” she confessed sincerely. “And if I am honest… I think I felt it long before that.” Her arms fell to her sides; she wanted to sit back at his side and feel the stroke of his fingers in her hair again, yet she felt nervous about what he thought of her after the insane rambling session she had just put him through. “ I’m… I’m sorry… I know this is all…” She embedded her fingers in her hair as her face practically crashed into her hands. “I will try not to use the book unless I need to.” She finally mumbled into her palms.

“Lottie…” Her name left his lips in a voice so hoarse it sounded wrecked on his tongue.

Cassius could not fix all her problems with a blade. There was no throat in front of him to cut, no door to break down, no single enemy he could drag into the light and make answer for what had been done to her. It was not that kind of battle, nor that type of war she was fighting.

… But every word she confessed was important. The details, each and every one, were important. Details…specifics…they could dig through it all later. What mattered most in that moment, what was more important than anything else, was the raw, vulnerable, terrified girl that above all else needed help. As Charlotte buried her head in her hands, he finally broke.

He rose full of purpose and crossed the space between them, wrapping his arms around her, pulling her into him with desperation as he held her with every ounce of protective care that coursed through his veins. He held her as though if he did not she would fall apart piece by piece; his arms… his NEED for her to be okay acting as the threads that may stitch her together once more and hold her steady.

“I’m sorry…” Was all he could manage at first. “I’m so sorry, Lottie. I won’t let anything like that happen again. I’ll help you... I’ll do anything.” He kissed the top of her head with trembling lips, glad that she had declared not to open the book.

Charlotte buried her face in his chest and wrapped her arms around him just as tightly, as if holding him harder could make the moment last. No words came to mind, so she focused on the thudding of his heart. The room around them shifted in her mind’s eye, and for a moment they were back in the Damien ballroom, his arms around her the very same way.

Despite everything she had accused him of the other night, the only memories she could attribute to Cassius were the ones where he made her feel safe. They hadn’t known each other long in the grand scheme of things, but it might as well have been forever—he broke down her walls with such ease that she could not reach any other conclusion.

Maybe Calbert had been the one trying to separate them, but in the end, she knew it was the way Cassius made her feel that truly kept her running from him… and inevitably, it was also what kept her coming back here, back into his arms.

And even if Charlotte knew this wasn’t sensible, even if he cared about her so much that her death would destroy him, even if this night was all they could have—tonight she couldn’t—wouldn’t—bring herself to leave his arms.

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Location: Grand Ballroom
Time: Evening
Interactions: Count Calbert Damien
Mentions: Lady Charlotte Vikena @princess
Outfit: Bro Be Looking SO DAMN GOOD oh maw gawd

---

The herald’s voice carried cleanly across the ballroom, rising above the music just enough to bend the attention of the room toward the entrance, and one by one the Damiens were announced.

For a brief moment, it felt as though the whole of the grand hall turned to look at them at once. The Damiens had arrived with all the pomp and circumstance you would expect from a family of their stature, and at the center of that spectacle, Cassius found himself walking with a confidence that came far too easily for a man who still, in his quieter moments, felt like an intruder in this world.

He often wondered if maybe that was the cruel little joke of it all. He did not belong here. Not really. Not in silk-draped halls under painted ceilings, not beneath chandeliers and royal eyes, not among men who wielded reputation like weapons of war and women taught from birth how to smile without ever showing their teeth. He had spent too much of his life in mud and blood and smoke to mistake himself for one of them. Yet when the room looked, he knew exactly how to carry it.

Cassius moved at his father’s side like he had been born to this all along, broad-shouldered and proud. Black wrapped him from throat to boot in sharp, tailored lines that only made the breadth of his shoulders and the hard-earned strength in his frame more striking, while silver embroidery climbed across his chest and sleeves in elegant, aristocratic patterns that caught the light whenever he moved.

A dark cloak fell from his shoulders in heavy folds, trimmed in pale fur that softened the ensemble. Gold fastenings gleamed at his shoulders and belt, a chain draped at his hip, and black gloves covered his hands with the same handsome refinement as the rest of him. The coat sat close through the torso, the fine fabric unable to hide the fact that there was a soldier’s body beneath it rather than a noble’s softness. And to top it all off… the scar over his eye, that storm-dark hair streaked in silver, and the sharp smile of a rogue that he wore so damn well only accentuated the presence he effortlessly carried with him.

The center of attention had always suited him, for better or for worse. Whether on a battlefield or in a tavern… there was something in him that knew how to draw the eye and keep it, how to wear arrogance just loosely enough to be irritatingly charming. Still, by the time the family had advanced far enough into the ballroom to satisfy decorum and appearances alike, he found himself wanting one thing more than any dance, any conversation, any manufactured pleasantry under this painted night sky that adorned the ceiling.

A well-earned, delicious, stiff drink. After the execution earlier and all the bullshit surely to come. He knew it was what he needed most.

With a quiet word excusing himself from the orbit of his family, Cassius drifted toward the refreshments, already reaching for a glass before he had fully stopped. The crystal caught the light as he lifted it, amber liquid within gleaming rich and warm, and he took the first sip like a man greeting an old friend. Gods was it good.

His shoulders eased by a fraction as the burn settled in his chest, and for a moment he simply stood there with one hand curled around the glass, letting the music swell around him while the ballroom spun on in all its glittering excess. Then, without needing to look, he felt the presence at his side.

“You do wear it well.” His father offered with a sly grin.

Cassius glanced sideways, watching his father arrive beside him as the man prepared himself a drink of his own; his long, luscious, and always voluminous hair falling to one shoulder like an artist's rendition of what a god might look like walking among mere mortals. Every inch the Count of Montauppe, composed and distinguished in a way that made half the men in the room look like boys playing dress-up, there was no visible strain in him, no crack in the polished exterior, only that measured calm of his and the sort of presence that never needed to demand attention because it had long ago grown accustomed to receiving it. They were not alike in every way, but yet they were unmistakably father and son. Both in appearance and in mystique.

“The drink?” Cassius bantered, swirling the liquor in his glass before taking another sip. “I’ll agree with you there, father.”

A quiet huff of amusement left Calbert through his nose as the man continued.

“Not the drink.” His father’s gaze drifted over the ballroom before returning to him. “All of this.”

Cassius let the words sit between them for a moment. Around them, servants glided by with trays of delicacies and nobility continued their little ritual of being seen seeing one another, but here, at the edge of the drinks table, the moment narrowed down into something smaller that somehow felt like the two of them were all alone.

“You make it sound as though I’ve passed some test.”

“Would you rather I say you have exceeded expectation?”

That earned the faintest twitch of a grin from Cassius despite himself. He turned his glass in his hand and shook his head once.

“I suppose I should be flattered you had expectations at all.”

Calbert regarded him for a beat, the sort of look only fathers could give when they were deciding how much truth the moment could bear.

“Cassius.” His voice softened, not weak or uncertain, merely stripped of some of its usual performance. “You are my son. Of course I had expectations. The pleasant surprise has been in how often you surpass them.”

There it was. That realness…that thing that made all of this more complicated. It would have been easier, perhaps, if Calbert had been cold from the beginning, if he had treated Cassius like a stain on his bloodline, an inconvenience, a secret returned to embarrass him. Cassius had known men like that, had prepared for one… But the full package of what he got in Calbert was something that he had never been prepared to face.

Instead of coldness, Calbert had opened the door with a father’s love.

Imperfect, and not without complication, but he had met him with dignity all the same, and there were nights Cassius hated how much that meant to him. He stared out over the ballroom rather than at his father. “You’ve been better to me than most men would have been.”

“Most men are not me.”

The answer came so smoothly, so simply, that Cassius almost laughed. It was vain, of course. Completely self-assured. It was the exact kind of thing he would have said in such a moment, but yet still… it was somehow entirely Calbert of him.

But most of all, it was not untrue.

“No,” Cassius murmured. “They are not.”

A silence settled then, though it was not empty. Calbert let it breathe, which Cassius noticed. The Count never wasted silence. He used it, shaped it, let a man fill it with his own thoughts until the conversation had already advanced without either of them saying a word. Cassius had learned that much about him quickly. Thankfully he had always been a fast learner in regards to people.

When Calbert finally spoke again, his tone remained calm, though the undercurrent had changed.

“I heard you were seen with her again.” The Count addressed.

Cassius closed his eyes briefly and let out a slow exhale, his jaw already tightening before he could help it. “You’ll have to be more specific. I’ve been seen with countless “hers”…in quite a number of compromising situations in my life.” Cas quipped.

“Charlotte Vikena.”

The name hit him somewhere low and irritated, somewhere already bruised from too many thoughts that Cassius had no interest in examining tonight. He tipped the rest of the liquor back and set the empty glass aside before reaching for another with a restraint that felt noble enough to deserve applause.

“You do have a remarkable talent for knowing my every move.”

“And you,” Calbert replied, “have a remarkable talent for finding yourself near that girl each time I begin to believe the matter settled.”

Cassius took a slower drink from the new glass, more to buy himself a second than because he needed it.

“There is nothing to settle.”

Calbert’s expression did not sharpen, but something in his gaze did. “You continue to insist that, yes.”

“Because it’s true.”

“Is it?”

Cassius turned then, meeting his father fully at last. “What exactly is it you want from me here, Father?” he asked, the word still strange enough in his mouth that it carried a weight of its own. “An oath? A confession? Or would you simply prefer I start avoiding half of Sorian to ensure I have not been in the presence of any man or woman who could have possibly breathed the same air as Lady Vikena?”

For another man, that might have been insolence enough to sour the whole exchange. For Calbert, it only drew a small, almost rueful breath.

“I want,” he said carefully, “for the son I have only just been gifted to understand that caution is not the same thing as cruelty, and concern is not the same thing as control, no matter how often you may choose to interpret it that way.”

Cassius’s eyes narrowed slightly. There it was too, the other half of him, the one that could make affection sound so perilously close to strategy. The business man. The one that had dealings with the Black Rose. The one that smiled at noble tables and shook hands in the shadows with scum like Alexander Deacon.

“And I want,” Cassius returned, voice quieter now, “for the father I’ve only just met to understand that some of us spent enough of our lives being ordered about by men with too much power and too little conscience that we no longer bow to anyone whose concern feels all too similar to a game of chess.”

The music swelled somewhere behind them as a longer pause stretched between the two men this time. Laughter rang out from another cluster of nobles. Somewhere farther off, crystal chimed against crystal. Calbert did not flinch at the bluntness of his son’s words. If anything, his eyes softened.

“You think I do not hear the accusation tucked inside that.”

Cassius looked away first, which annoyed him immediately. “You only hear what you want.”

His father turned his own glass slowly between elegant fingers, studying the liquor as though it contained something worth examination. When he spoke again, the arrogance was gone from him, or at least banked low enough to be almost invisible.

“You are not wrong to question such things.” He glanced at Cassius then. “Nor are you wrong to resent the fact that you arrived in my life already old enough to need to.”

That landed harder than Cassius wanted it to. Because in some ways, that was the shape of it, wasn’t it. Not boy and father. Not really. They had skipped the easy years, the years when trust might have been built. They had met instead as men, both fully made in their own ways, both already carrying too much of the world on their shoulders.

“I don’t know what to do with this,” Cassius admitted before he could stop himself, his voice low enough that it almost disappeared beneath the music. “With any of it. This family… this name…you.”

Calbert was quiet a long moment, and when he answered, there was something unexpectedly bare in it.

“Neither do I, entirely.”

That made Cassius look at him again. Calbert Damien, Count of Montauppe, smooth-tongued master of rooms, admitting uncertainty in the middle of a grand ballroom when otherwise he glowed like a dream.

“But I know I would rather try and fail than not try at all.” His mouth curved faintly, though there was no mockery in it. “And I know that whatever suspicion you may carry toward me, whatever grievances may yet bloom between us, none of that changes what you are.”

His gaze held steady on Cassius.

“My son.”

It was possessive, and paternal. It was, in its own way, deeply sincere. And it was so very Calbert that Cassius once again almost did laugh then, only the sound died before it reached his mouth.

For a moment, neither of them said anything at all. Then Calbert lifted his glass for a toast between them and them alone. His voice, when it came, was smooth again, but not empty of feeling.

“Tonight and forevermore, as family.”

Cassius looked at the raised glass, then at his father’s face, and found there the same impossible feelings he had been grappling with since stepping into this man’s orbit. Affection, mistrust, the understanding of the darkness of the man before him and wondering where its depths end. And somewhere, deep down with Cassius… the yearning to be understood equally by this man. By his father.

His jaw clenched.

Still, he lifted his own glass and touched it gently to Calbert’s. He did not say anything in return, but the gesture was enough as the crystal chimed softly between them, delicate as anything in that ballroom, and Cassius drank with all the mixed emotions in the world sitting bitter in his chest and burning at the back of his throat harsher than any liquor ever could.

And just like that, Calbert parted from his son and re-entered the mob of noble faces surrounding them. It was where the man belonged. As his father disappeared into the crowd, Cassius turned back to face the table once more. All at once, all the while, he somehow felt closer to the man than he ever had… and yet even though his face did not show it, even surrounded by dozens of people having the time of their lives, he felt more alone than ever before.

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

Time: Evening of Ignis 10
Location: Danrose Castle
Mentions: Marina @princess, Lucian @HylianRose

“But first and foremost, I am here for Lucy, so I am rather interested in making certain the women of this court have not pulled every last shining red lock from his head.”

Ambrose’s gaze followed the line of Marina’s fan as she surveyed the ballroom. There was no missing the prince once one knew where to look. Lucian stood across the room in a knot of nobles and candlelight, all polished poise and irritatingly princely composure, his auburn hair made him stand out like a sore thumb.

His jaw set almost imperceptibly as his eyes settled on Lucian. Whoever the prince had been speaking to moments ago was no longer holding his attention, carried off instead by the natural ebb and flow of the ballroom, leaving him standing momentarily alone between conversations. How convenient.

The tension that always bubbled between the Knight and the Prince he was sworn to protect was something that Ambrose’s face struggled to hide. This moment was no exception. The man’s vigilant expression shifted into more of a scowl as he realized that soon the two would be forced to interact. Still, Marina had made her target known, and above any personal issues he may have with the Prince… His honor, and duty came first. The woman simply wished to see her brother, and that, at least, Ambrose understood without difficulty.

“There he is.” His voice dropped low for her ears alone, dry as old parchment. “And thankfully for you, your brother appears to be mostly in one piece.” His gaze shifted back to the princess as he spoke, and he allowed the scowl to soften into a look of sarcasm that she would surely recognize. “This way, princess…” He said as he moved to part the crowd and make way so a sister could be reunited with her brother after a long, trying day.