I deskinned the rest of the oxen while Anabeth helpfully contributed not being present to offer distracting comments. Skinning, it turned out, was not a fast process. It was methodical in the way only deeply unglamorous labor could be, and my arms began to ache in that specifically low-grade way that promised worse tomorrow. By the time I finished the last carcass, the creeping dim of a day quietly giving up had shadowed the sky.
I automatically reached for my pannier to fetch the herbs Anabeth was supposed to gather for me… only to realize I hadn’t actually gotten any herbs.
She had harvested them, hadn’t she?
I sighed. I suppose I would need to look for her once more.
I found her again, not far from a ravine, flat on her back in the grass, very aggressively harvesting herbs. By which I meant she was yanking them up with far more force than the plants had personally earned, muttering under her breath as she worked. “Argh… no, Anabeth. You are such an idiot.”
That stopped me short.
Curiosity, as ever, proved stronger than good sense. I slowed, then slowed further, placing each step with deliberate care. The Saints had been quite clear on this matter. One should not eavesdrop. It was rude. It was improper. It was a fast track to awkward revelations and spiritual disapproval.
I knew all of this.
I also knew I had already reduced my pace to a crawl.
She lay there, scowling up at the darkening sky, fingers still busy tearing herbs free and tossing them into an increasingly abused pile. “You’re supposed to charm him with your mysterious energy. He’d surely get swept off his feet by a lady who can hold her ground. Yes. That. Very dignified. “Or—” she went on, voice rising, “or you’re supposed to annoy him so greatly he claims you out of sheer frustration. Oh, yes. Brilliant. That was the plan. Then he’d be so angered he’d have to claim you violently. Yes, yes. The more violent the better. Very romantic. Saints, Anabeth.” Another herb suffered a swift, vengeful demise. “Anything… anything but this.”
The more violent the what…
I did not, upon reflection, need to hear the rest of that sentence ever again.
This was the point where a sensible person would retreat, return to where they had come from, wait an appropriate amount of time, then reappear later with the firm, comforting lie that they had just arrived and absolutely had not overheard anything even remotely incriminating.
I began to turn.
My armor, sensing narrative opportunity, chose that exact moment to creak.
It was not a subtle sound. It was the drawn-out complaint of stressed leather and metal articulating their deep objections to stealth.
Anabeth yelped and launched herself upright. One hand went to her chest, the other still clutching a fistful of mangled greenery.
“Oh! Sir Knight—” she blurted. “How long have you been there?” Herbs scattered in every direction.
Several possible answers presented themselves, all of them lies, and none of them convincing. So I said, “A man of the Saints would most appreciate honesty, Lady Anabeth.”
That was such a foolish thing to say.
I had invoked honesty while offering none of my own, and the contradiction sat poorly with me. So I did the only thing that suggested itself. I sat down and spoke, “The Order of Saint Merin has existed far longer than the current constellation of recognized Orders.”
That much, at least, sounded correct.
“It predates the Compact Charters, before the Twelvefold Flames standardized sanction and approval. In those days, power was… distributed. Each region held its own authority, its own dangers. The knighthood was custodial. Academic, even. We preserved local histories and mediated disputes. Knowledge and steel passed together, from knight to squire, not hoarded in capitals where it could be weaponized by distance.”
Anabeth sat down across from me. She did not interrupt.
“In Mostenstein,” I went on, more quietly now, “the Order provided continuity or stability. We have survived at least five lordships, three border redrawings, and one burning of archives.” I swallowed. “We remained. Or were meant to. Saint Merin’s was never formally dissolved. It simply… stopped being acknowledged. And the question why should lies with the Order of the Twelvefold Flames, Lady Anabeth. Not with us.”
“Oh, good to know. Not that I’ve ever questioned your integrity, good Sir!” She put a finger on her chin. “But by ‘we’, do you mean there are more of you?”
“I am the last of my kind.” I had meant the words as clarification, nothing more. They did not feel like a confession until they were already spoken.
“Oh,” she said, pursing her lips, “That is a lonely thing to be.”
I waited for the inevitable cleverness, but it did not come.
She looked down instead, gathering a few of the scattered herbs and aligning their stems with absent-minded care. Her ears were still faintly pink. The silence stretched.
I found myself watching her rather than the sky. That felt… unwise.
Perhaps she was still unsettled by her earlier, unintentional confession. I could not blame her for that. I was hardly immune to the aftershocks of my own. The version of her seated across from me now—quieter, unguarded, momentarily unsure—felt more honest than the theatrics she usually deployed. Or perhaps I was projecting. I did not know her as well as I pretended to.
She cleared her throat at last. “You know,” she said, without looking up, “most people would have led with that. It saves time.”
“Most people,” I said, “would have presented the real version of themselves, and not a confident front assembled from expectation and advantage. ”
Anabeth let out a short, nervous laugh. “Now that is wishful thinking, Sir Knight. Nobody really presents themselves like that.” She looked more serious now. “And for the record, I wasn’t inventing a personality. It’s just… another side of me. We present different faces to different people. If I show you this side, it’s because… I miscalculated.”
I wanted to speak my true mind, but annoyingly, I was seated, and my Stamina had returned to 51%. Still, moments, like battles, had windows. Miss them, and all that remained was aftermath and regret. I had already spent enough of my life arriving one step too late, saying the right things only to myself.
I said, “I very much prefer the version where you miscalculate, Anabeth.”
She laughed and waved a hand, too quickly. “Yes, well. I know that. But if you prefer me when I miscalculate, that would imply you enjoy it when I’m… forward. And I have been very forward with you, Sir Knight. Yet you barely react.”
She was fishing for an admission she already suspected was there. I considered deflection for a second, but then acted against it.
“I enjoy your company, and I wish to know you better than I currently do.”
She held her breath.
“However, you must understand that I have circumstances that limit how openly I may present myself, and as such, restraint is an obligation, which would mean I could only offer you my true form in due time.”
She hesitated, then nodded once. “Yes. Yes, of course. In due time. Me, as well.”
The last light had thinned into a muted violet. Crickets had begun their careful negotiations in the grass. We remained where we were, still two paces apart, close enough to be aware of each other’s breathing.
She looked at me sidelong. “So… what now?”
I was out of lines, but I needed to restore order to a situation that had drifted perilously off-script. I could just simply suggest that she went back to gathering her herbs, and there were very few ways Ceralis could sabotage me.
“You will finish what you have started,” I said. The words landed with far more weight than I had intended.
That was… one of the ways Ceralis could sabotage me.
“Oh,” she said. “All right.”
Relief followed. I was already imagining her returning to the abused pile of herbs.
She then stood, and… sat on my lap. Her fingers slipped beneath the edge of my visor, tilting it halfway open.
“So,” she murmured, far too close, “you did tell me to be honest.”
My thoughts scattered.
Before I could marshal them, she leaned in and kissed me.
It was exploratory in the way of someone confirming a theory they were already confident was correct. The world narrowed to the soft scrape of her thumb against my jaw and the awareness that I had stopped breathing.
When she finally pulled back, the space between us felt conspicuously empty.
“Insolent witch,” I snapped. “I was referring to the herbs.”
She blinked repeatedly, then laughed, unrepentant. “Oops.” She settled more comfortably, as though this were merely a conversational adjustment rather than a deliberate provocation. Her hands slid from my shoulders to the edge of my cuirass, resting there. “Well, you did say to finish what I started. And we have already started. It would be a shame to abandon the task halfway through, wouldn’t it?”
I stared at her, incredulous.
“This was not the task.”
She hummed, thoughtful. “Ah. Then this is what—an unfortunate misunderstanding?”
“I am certain that you understood precisely how that would sound.”
“Mm.” Her thumb traced the line of my jaw again, slow enough to be deliberate. “Strange. You don’t look as though you’re misunderstanding me.”
Annoyance, surging and unproductive, had nowhere to go.
So I channeled it. I took her chin and claimed her lips before she could shape another word.
The kiss was silencing. She made a small sound of surprise that vanished immediately as she kissed me back, heat mingling with insistence as her tongue met mine. This was simply the most efficient way to continue the conversation.
“Mmm. Yes,” she said, eyes alight. “I suspect we are going to have this discussion many more times.”
“Gather the herbs.”
“Mmm… I’m gathering…” Anabeth swiftly hooked her fingers under the rim of my gorget, and pulled me down into a second, decidedly less diplomatic kiss.
For a moment, all that remained in my head was heat, pressure, her floral scent, and the reassuring percussion of Durand methodically punching the other stone golem’s head in somewhere behind us.
I kept one hand splayed against her back and used the other to guide her down to the ground, never quite breaking contact. Anabeth let out a soft sound as she pulled me into the dirt. Her fingers found purchase in the gaps of my armor, tugging earnestly.
Just as I settled over her, she turned her head to the side. I followed her gaze and saw it land on the skinned ox corpse, still fresh and glistening in the sunset. It smelled of ox.
“You’re choosing… here?” She asked. “Not quite the romantic, are you, Sir Knight?”
I opened my mouth to answer, fully prepared to defend the perfectly sound tactical merits of ‘here,’ and then I realized…
Hold on a second. I wasn’t choosing anything. The question assumed a decision I didn’t even remember making. She was making the decision for me and framing me as the perpetrator. Very cunning.
I questioned, ‘Were you attempting to maneuver me into conduct the Saints would find… objectionable?’
What came out of my mouth wasn’t that.
“Wretched witch,” I snarled. “If you seek to ensnare me again in heresy and fleshly impropriety, know this: I am sworn not merely to the Saint’s laws, but to his judgment. Test me once more, and you will learn precisely how far their mercy extends.”
Lightning split the sky, close enough that the thunder arrived almost on top of it—an explosive, cathedral-shaking boom that rolled across the ravine and sent startled birds screaming from the trees.
I froze, mortified by the ill-timed display. Yet…
“Oh. Sudden atmospheric punctuation,” Anabeth breathed in a voice so soft and utterly undone. “You do have exquisite taste.”
“Do not confuse consequence with intent,” I said. “Once invoked, my authority does not ask permission a second time. People are claimed whether they wish to be or not.” No. Stop. I hate you so much, Ceralis. You seriously couldn’t say anything worse than this.
Ceralis continued, “Obey me, or be claimed.”
Curse your name and all the Saints who taught you to exist, Ceralis.
Lightning split the sky in response.
Anabeth made a sound utterly undignified.
I stared at Anabeth, aghast. Was this some sort of arcane quirk I’d been unaware of? Did she get turned on whenever lightning struck?
Her hands curled into my tabard like she needed something solid to anchor her. She gasped, then hyperventilated. Or at least I thought she was hyperventilating until she formed a shackle from her choker again and presented it to me. Her hands shook as she whimpered, “Y-yes, please. Claim me… I’ll listen to your every word…”
That was not how that worked. Obey me or be claimed. Mutually exclusive conditions. She was conflating categories! You could not volunteer for both sides of the ultimatum. That defeated the entire point of issuing one.
I dragged in a breath. The dead ox was still within sight. Durand was still punching the other golem. Whatever catastrophic misunderstanding was unfolding, it would not unfold here, under the open sky, beside carrion, with witnesses from the road wandering about any moment.
“We are relocating,” I informed her.
She nodded immediately. Far too eagerly.
I slid one arm beneath her knees and rose in a single smooth motion, keeping her close and shielded by habit more than intention. This was a battlefield carry; nothing more.
Anabeth made a small, pleased sound and immediately looped her arms around my neck, pressing in, entirely too naturally.
“Mmm…” She rested her cheek against my pauldron. “Your armor is so warm, Sir Knight.”
I placed a firm hand under her thigh, deliberately staying silent to not trigger another ill-timed lightning strike.
I frowned. That made no sense. I had carried her on my back earlier without issue. There had been no training notification then.
This was lighter. More efficient. Textbook, even.
… Oh.
I became acutely aware that Anabeth was not remaining still. She kept pressing her hip against my side in a rubbing motion that was anything but accidental. Her breath hitched, a soft sound against my pauldron, and I could feel the slight tremor that ran through her.
My hand was getting tired from continuously preventing her from sliding closer.
“Witch! Cease your motion this instant!” I snarled.
“Oh—” she breathed, clinging tighter instead of loosening. “Like this?”
She went perfectly still… the moment she pressed her entire body against me. I seized up. Not because of what she imagined—Saints above—but because I could feel it. Not skin, not softness, not anything so direct. Layers of sanctified steel, padding, and mail stood between us. What reached me was heat, and weight, and the unmistakable redistribution of mass against my centerline.
How she could find this sensual was beyond me. I could only find her… heavy.
“I’m listening, Sir,” she whispered. “Tell me what to do.”
‘Please, Lady Anabeth. I am very much fond of you, but you ought to have some shame,’ I tried to say.
“I will make you feel shame,” I said.
Lightning struck once more.
Her breath caught so hard it sounded like a sob. “Ah—! I– ah…”
I looked down just in time to see a thin line of red slip free from one nostril and trail over her lip. Anabeth stared at the trail of blood and murmured, “Oh… that’s… not ideal…”
Her knees slackened. Her grip in my tabard loosened all at once. Then her head lolled back.
Anabeth went completely limp in my arms.
For a heartbeat, there was only the distant crackle of receding thunder and the rhythmic thud, thud of Durand still punching a golem somewhere behind me.
What in the Saints just happened?
I stared at the text. “... This did not just happen.”
Anabeth did not respond. She was very unconscious.
I adjusted my hold, angling her head to keep the blood from her airway and pointedly refusing to think about how any of this would look to an outside observer.
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