“Absolutely not! Even in the off chance I wanted to, now I’d have to wait for another opportunity since today your family had plenty of emotions already.”
“Ah.” Friya replied.
It was a single word, yet it carried the cold of an ice age and all of her scorn and disappointment.
“I see. I’m sorry for interrupting you. What were you saying?”
Nalrond wasn’t the most sensitive of men but the temperature in the room seemed to have dropped by dozens of degrees and Friya’s glare seemed to be trying to choke him with the power of her mind.
“That with the end of the War of the Griffons, your parents should have no reason to be scared about your future anymore.” He cautiously said while offering her tea and cookies that Friya didn’t even glance at.
“I say that we let a few days pass, maybe a couple of weeks, and then we can safely break the engagement.”
“You want to break the engagement?” She replied in shock.
“Well, yeah.” He shrugged. “Your father proposed on your behalf because of the war. This is something your parents wanted, not us. Also, let’s be honest. We don’t have a future. I can’t Awaken whereas you’ll live for a thousand years.
“Three thousand, if you become a Harbinger. I’m stuck as a hybrid and I still have no clue about how to merge my two life forces. Our children would be born as forced hybrids without even the choice to pick your side and-“
“Is this because my survival is bound to becoming Faluel’s Harbinger?” Friya cut him off. “Because I might lose my free will and a good chunk of my privacy?”
“No.” He shook his head. “Faluel is a wonderful person and I’m sure that she’d treat her Harbinger as a partner, not as a slave. I believe that you are in good hands.”
“Then is this because you don’t feel anything for me? Was this only sex for you? Did meeting my family and living together never mean anything to you?” She said in outrage, clenching her hands so hard that they popped.
“Gods, no! How can you even think that?” Nalrond was as outraged as her, but the pain in Friya’s eyes made him realize how bad his words had to sound to her ears.
He gently grabbed her shoulders, taking a deep breath to calm down before speaking.
“Look, I’m not going to beat around the bush any longer. I love you, but I’m not the right guy for you. You need-” A slap to his face cut him short again.
“How can you say that you love me and drop me like a bad habit?” Friya said with eyes veiled with tears.
“I told you already. I’m going to be a decrepit old man before a single of your hair turns grey and I’d pass my hybrid nature on to my children. You deserve-“
A second slap hit him. Just like the previous, it was just as strong as one from a regular woman, showing that even in her fury she didn’t want to hurt him.
“I decide who I deserve, jackass! You don’t get to choose that for me.” She stood right in front of him, grabbing Nalrond from the collar of his shirt.
Friya forced him to bend down and look her in the eyes.
“Yes, I do because it wouldn’t be fair to you or your family. They don’t need to know the truth about me and there’s no point telling them. I’m doing this because I love you and I want to spare you the suffering of seeing me die.
“Of being forced to choose between not having children or watching them die as well. You-“
? “I love you too, jackass!” She said with a snarl, never averting her gaze.
“Oh.” Nalrond said, suddenly feeling like the biggest idiot on Mogar.
“Oh, indeed.” Friya let him go, turning around in anger. “Congratulations. You’ve managed to pull the least romantic love confession in Mogar’s history. This will be really hard to beat.”
The Rezar tried to find the words to patch things up, but his brain refused to work.
“Do you really love me?” He asked with a dumb expression on his face.
“Yes, I do. And I really hoped you would propose to me earlier.” She half turned toward him, still giving him the back but also showing him her lips twirled up in anger.
“Well…”
“Don’t you dare do it now!” She said after noticing that he was about to kneel. “You’ve ruined it. You’ve ruined everything and I’m leaving.”
Friya walked through the door of her room, slamming it with enough force to make the wall tremble.
“Stupid idiot!” Nalrond said to himself. “Years spent mocking Morok and then you act like such a fool that in comparison he’s Valeron himself. The only way I could have made things even worse was to joke about the fact that since Faluel has to be a big part of our life, we might as well invite her to a threes-“
“Why the fuck aren’t you chasing after me?” Friya’s voice came through the closed door.
“I fucked up so much. She’ll never let me hear the end of this. Even if I Awaken, she’ll throw this in my face on her deathbed.”
“Are you coming or not?” Friya yelled again.
“I’m sorry! I mean it. I’m worse than a Morok!” Nalrond bolted forward, praying for the Great Mother to give him a third brain since both of his human and Rezar brains seemed to be completely useless.
***
Blood Desert, Heavenly Plume Palace, right after Lith departed from the Ernas Mansion.
Thanks to Tyris, they had no need for geysers or the Kingdom’s Gate Network. They reached their destination in a single step yet it was one step too many.
Lith was already exhausted from the final battle against Thrud and the destruction of the Golden Griffon. Visiting Phloria’s resting place had put a burden on his psyche as big as the one that summoning Juria had put on his body.
He collapsed the moment the presence of Salaark’s palace and of his family made Lith feel safe. If not for Tyris catching him on the fly, he would have fallen face-first on the floor.
“We have to stop meeting like this.” She chuckled while lifting him in a princess carry before putting him down on an armchair.
“Very funny.” He mumbled, his voice barely audible.
“Is he alright?” Elina rushed to his side in fear that another fight might have broken out.
Bad luck seemed to follow her son like his own shadow. No matter how much she prayed for him, Lith seemed to never catch a break.
“I’m fine, Mom. I’m just tired.” Lith felt his eyes drooping, talking required sheer willpower.
“You should have seen him, Elina. I’m really proud of him.” Kamila caressed his hair and used a mind link of her own to share the events with the rest of the family and spare Lith from the effort. “He gave Orion and Jirni closure.
“Lith summoned the spirit of Juria Ernas and despite how weak he already was, he offered to help Tyris as well.”
