“It’s beautiful,” Tybalt said quietly.

  “R-really?” Victoria asked. She couldn’t help the smile that crept over her lips, but she still watched his face carefully, her eyes narrowed.

  He’s just flattering me. Victoria thought that, objectively, it was probably a pretty average garden. Maybe below average, considering that she had created it here on a mountainside above the desert. It was her own small slice of peace, but she didn’t try to tell herself that it would compare to the beauty of places Tybalt had seen in his travels as a soldier. He had mentioned casually, over dinner- as if it were no big deal- that he had been to the various corners of Niet, including their border regions, in the opposite direction from the Salt Waste, thousands of miles apart. He had spent time as far away as Verma, which he’d mentioned was near the border with the Walian Empire.

  Actually, why did I even bother taking him here…? I’m probably embarrassing myself.

  “Yeah,” he said, his voice still soft. “I can see the love you poured into it, and believe it or not, despite my life choices so far, I do appreciate beauty. Those flowers there go really well together. Using actual desert roses is a nice touch. You picked a spot with a great view…”

  The words almost blurred together as she listened to him and watched his face.

  He is really good at talking. He could almost make her believe he meant it and wasn’t just trying to win her over. As she looked at his face, she allowed herself to notice that he was handsome, too. Annoyingly so. Is it because Vidalia described him so much? It feels like his face is familiar. Those green eyes are so bright. Like emeralds set in his irises.

  She realized he was finishing, and she made herself pay proper attention to what he was saying again.

  “I wish my mother had made a place like this for herself,” he concluded. “Probably would have given her a lot of peace that she didn’t have.

  “I, um, thank you, Lor- I mean, Tybalt.”

  He smiled. “Thank you for bringing me. I can tell this place is special.”

  She felt strange. Some emotion she didn’t recognize was rising in her chest. She swallowed.

  Focus.

  “Um, I should move the conversation to more serious topics,” Victoria said. “Since we have only recently met, and the courtship didn’t start with a formal meeting between our families, there are a few things that have been left unspoken.”

  He frowned slightly but nodded for her to go ahead.

  With a sense of foreboding, Victoria continued, “It might seem a little silly, but I should ask you what you’re planning for the future, how you’re going to, um, take care of me and help my family, and, um… what life with you would be like.” She felt slightly embarrassed as she finished, but she managed to maintain eye contact. These were important matters. There was no sense in any feeling of shame about bringing them up.

  “Victoria, do you really need me to answer those questions?” Tybalt replied, his voice turning serious. She immediately looked down at her feet, the embarrassment flaring up even harder. “My plan for the future is to conquer and defeat the Kingdom using an army of the dead. I already have the core of that army lying in the Valley of Martyrs, enough future soldiers to fight against a modest-sized army from the Kingdom openly. After a few battles, we’ll probably have enough troops to storm the capital. As for you and your family… you should know I’ll take care of you. No one can do that better than me. I’m the most powerful person in these mountains, at least.

  “If Vidalia’s plotting goes as she wants it to, I’ll be the most powerful by law as well. Assume that you’ll have at least as good of a lifestyle with me as anyone else among your people. And it’s only natural that I’d take care of my in-laws. What exactly that looks like for your family depends on the circumstances we find ourselves in, but I’m sure we can find some useful place to employ Uncle Edmund that keeps him off his feet. This stuff, though, it’s very, um, transactional. I get that it’s important to a marriage negotiation, but I can discuss it with your uncle. With you, I’d rather talk about the things that will matter in twenty or thirty years. Personal things.”

  Did I annoy him? she wondered. It was hard to tell. She felt like she’d just been mildly scolded, but the last part of what he’d said had made it very clear that he was still interested in potentially marrying her and Vidalia.

  “Like, what would you, um, want to t-talk about?” Victoria asked a little nervously.

  “Start by asking me what you actually want to ask me,” he said firmly. “From your heart.”

  She turned to look at him, and he was staring at her, their bodies much closer than she had realized. Her heart started to pound as their eyes met, but she found she could not look away or step back, even as he leaned in slightly. She was paralyzed, her mind split between what he’d said and the positions of their bodies.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  I know what he wants me to- no, what I want to ask him.

  “Are you actually interested in me?” she asked. “Or are you just talking to me because I’m a… a bonus you get if you marry my sister?”

  That is actually something I wanted to know, she thought. She felt immediately a little guilty for abandoning her duty to investigate the practical questions more closely. But at least she had gotten some hint at answers, and he would talk to her uncle, and this- this was important too. She rubbed her hands together, tried to calm herself- Why are my palms sweaty?

  “That’s it,” he said approvingly. “The answer is yes. I don’t know you that well yet, but yes, I’m definitely interested in everything I hear and see. If you weren’t appealing to me, I’d tell Vidalia, ‘Hey, let’s get married, and let your sister do what she wants. She’ll still be under my protection, but let her live her own life.’ But I am actually interested in you. Not because you’re Vidalia’s twin, not out of beastfolk tradition, but for good reasons that I’ve already explained. As far as I’m concerned, the only difference your family connection makes is that it got you to take me seriously as a suitor immediately.” The necromancer paused and seemed to be thinking about something. “I can see you’re not sure whether to believe me.” He licked his lips and moved his face an inch nearer to hers, a smile playing over his face. “What can I do to convince you?”

  When did he get so close? Victoria thought. His features suddenly seemed to take up her whole field of view, those bright emerald green eyes so close to hers that she could count his eyelashes. She swallowed nervously.

  “That’s, um, you don’t need to. I mean, I believe you.” An instinct told her to step back, but she also felt a strange fluttering in her stomach that she had never experienced before.

  “That’s a pity. I had an idea or two for how.”

  “This is too close,” she said softly, warningly. Victoria recognized she was blushing, tried to flatten out her expression, and wondered if she had given Tybalt some signal that invading her space in this way was acceptable. She considered whether stepping back would be rude. She could smell his masculine odor, could almost feel his long hair against her skin. She raised one hand above her waist, ready to slip it between their mouths or push him away- whatever she needed to do.

  If… If he gets closer, I will slap him. I’m not letting him kiss me. No. No.

  He reached up and cupped her cheek, and Victoria managed to avoid either leaning into his touch or pushing him away. Her hand rose slightly, resting on the firm muscle of his chest, but otherwise, she was just standing there passively, not participating.

  “Can I kiss you?” he whispered.

  She was more than a little surprised that he’d asked, instead of just trying to do it. They were so close, and she knew a little about how he had behaved with Mariella. She had been ready to defend herself from such advances from him, as she had done with Andric. But her answer was obvious.

  That’s only for my future husband, she thought.

  “N-no, I’m not ready, not ready yet,” she stammered.

  Yet? What are you saying? Not ready yet? You’re practically promising you’ll let him kiss you later, dummy! Is he proposing? No! Did you and he agree on something? No! Ugh! Shut up!

  “All right. Well, I hope you at least believe in the sincerity of my intentions.” His hand caressed her cheek once more, then moved away. He stepped slightly back.

  That was nice. Victoria didn’t allow herself to consider whether she actually wanted to kiss him- or why her heart sank slightly when he stepped back. Those questions were irrelevant.

  “Um, we should be getting back,” she said, trying to keep her voice calm as her pulse gradually slowed back down.

  I think I sounded like myself, right? Yeah. Perfect.

  Suddenly, against her will, she pictured him drawing closer, cupping her cheek again, kissing her - and her kissing him back. She shook her head slightly to clear the image from her mind. Her stomach did a little flip.

  What’s gotten into me?

  She looked at Tybalt. He was grinning down at her, lips slightly parted, about to speak.

  He knows, doesn’t he? He knows… what I’m thinking about.

  Her eyes, against her will, focused on his lips instead of trying to read his expression properly. Did she actually want to kiss him? It wasn’t something she had felt with any of the boys who had attempted to court her.

  This wasn’t good.

  I’m not going to be able to think about him with distance, she thought worriedly. If my feelings are compromising my judgment, I need to go and seek objective advice from some of the older women in the tribe. I can’t talk to Elder Elswyth, since she technically adopted Tybalt. Perhaps Elder Sybil would help…

  The old alchemist was close to Vidalia and had occasionally looked out for the twins since their mother died.

  “We can head back if you’re already bored of me,” Tybalt said teasingly.

  Victoria looked up at him and tried to gauge whether he was serious for a split-second. She didn’t want to jeopardize the courtship by insulting him before she decided what she wanted to do.

  All right, no, he’s definitely messing with you.

  “There’s never a dull moment with you around,” Victoria said, trying to respond to the energy in his voice. She was only slightly annoyed that her voice shook as she spoke. “But it’s already almost sunset. We don’t want to miss- ”

  A sudden flash of bright orange lit up the sky, and both of them suddenly turned to face into the desert.

  “What’s that?” Tybalt asked.

  “It’s… trouble.”