8
1357 Words
She had used the money he gave her to have a high priority message sent to him saying she couldn’t join a team with someone like Matt.
She had hoped he would give her the okay and allow her to set off on her own, but he had put his foot down.
Either she came back to his estate and his protection, stayed with his niece, or she got a high Tier babysitter to watch over her and ensure nothing bad happened to her.
She wanted to lash out and refuse.
She wanted to show him that she was ready.
She wanted to do a lot of things.
In the end, he had done so much for her after saving her and he was the one person she knew she could trust. She just couldn’t return to his estate and all the therapists.
It had become too stifling.
She had trained to be able to protect herself and didn’t want a high Tier bodyguard she didn’t know watching her at all times. To have that much power over her.
That was too reminiscent of before.
Which meant she needed to get along with his attractive niece and her boyfriend who reminded her of Duke Cumulus far, far too much.
3
The following day, Matt hand-fed Aster a select package of rabbit that Aunt Helen had prepared. She would be coming out of her stupor soon, and he wanted to see what changes she would experience.
Once his bond was fed, he knocked on Liz’s door, and they made their way up to the train car with a breakfast bar. They sat down and watched the plains turn into deserts. The hills slowly transitioned to more sand than dirt.
It made a nice addition to their breakfast view. His relaxed state of mind was short lived, as Matt felt a hovering presence a few moments later. When he looked, he found Camilla standing there with a plate of her own food.
To give an overture of peace, he kneed the swivel chair next to him, causing it to spin toward her. She sat but perched at the edge as if ready to defend herself at any moment.
Matt played with his omelet. The cook must have been drunk because the omelet was nearly burnt on the outside and close to raw on the inside, while also heavily under-seasoned. If it had been intentional, it might have been good, but it was mostly just disappointing. Still, he plopped a forkful into his mouth. At least it was hard to mess up pre-cooked ham and mushrooms.
“I’m sorry.”
The apology was abrupt, and he and Liz turned to face their breakfast companion.
“I have been staying with Aiden for the last few years, but I couldn’t sit around anymore. So, I made a deal with him. If I wanted to come out, I needed to stay with you guys or have a bodyguard. And I really don’t want that.” Camilla swallowed hard and squeaked out, “Or go back, but I need to get out and stretch my legs.”
She finished with a half-hearted shrug. “I’m sorry for being curt with you two yesterday. I just have a hard time not seeing someone else in you.” She nodded to Matt as she finished.
Liz spoke up, “Thank you for apologizing. If you want to” –the blood mage twirled her spoon around—“join us, even if it’s just for a while. But we don’t know you or anything about you.”
Camilla opened her mouth to say something, but Liz spoke up first, “So, we figure we should try and spend time together. At least while we travel. We can all make a better decision when we reach the vassal kingdom. What my uncle wants is irrelevant.”
That ended the conversation, and they finished up their food in a more companionable silence. Camilla walked to the front of the train, while Matt and Liz returned to their rooms. They needed to start the process of learning their new skills as they had a short window to do it if they wanted to expand the skill before the end of this train ride.
Matt sat with Aster as the veil of grogginess started to lift away from their bond. He threw Liz a message saying that Aster was waking up. A moment later, she entered the room, only to find the fox scratching at her neck where the AI was implanted.
From their bond, Matt got much more feedback. More emotion, and even the start of what almost felt like words. It was like a thin pipe had been replaced with a much larger one, letting more of who Aster was in. Her small form repeated what she did when she had first hatched and explored everything around her.
Matt got the sense that new ideas were forming from the old scents and objects. Liz talked to her in the yips and clicks that made the beast language, which made Aster flick her ears, and her tail poofed as if she was startled.
Matt patted her and ran her tail through a hand until she defluffed.
It’s not like she hasn’t heard this before. She uses Liz to ask for ice cream all the time.
The idle thought was the wrong thing to say, as the fox perked back up when he thought the words ice cream. The fox was at the door in a flash after a moment of stillness. Matt felt her push ‘Ice cream!’ through their bond.
Liz simply laughed while he sat there and contemplated pounding his head against the wall.
“The first thought you have is of ice cream? I feel betrayed.”
Aster c****d her head and yipped at him. Liz’s giggle continued while a picture of a heart and a questioning color was pushed through to him from his bond.
“I don’t have a heart for you to eat either. You’re a glutton. But, okay, let’s go see what they have.”
They made their way back to the food car. Walking through the halls made Matt feel exposed, as though someone would try to steal the skill shard in its bracelet. He knew it was locked down tight, but the lingering fear remained. The skill was worth too much for him to be comfortable until it was absorbed properly.
When they arrived at the food car, they found Camilla sitting at a table on her own. She didn’t have a plate, so Matt wasn’t sure what she was doing, but she glanced at the opening door and smiled at the bounding white fox. The look of happiness at the sight of Aster bounding toward the ice cream was a look he never expected on her cold face. Camilla’s gaze rose from the small fox, up to the accompanying humans, but when she saw Matt, her face froze, and the smile became brittle.
At Aster’s insistence, they all got bars of various kinds of ice cream. On a whim, Matt snagged a bar for Camilla. She took it but was clearly more entertained at Aster’s antics than the snack.
The fox in question devoured her own bar, then tried to steal pieces of Matt and Liz’s ice cream, too.
They let her have a bite or two, but Camilla’s slow pace was her undoing. Aster saw the bar with only one nibble and gave the dark-haired woman a pleading look.
To Matt’s surprise, it won the woman over, and she offered up the bar after looking to him and Liz for confirmation that it was okay. As Aster ate, Camilla ran her hand over the fox’s fluff, clearly enjoying the silken fur.
The smile Camilla gave Aster made Matt feel like she wasn’t all that bad. She clearly had some trauma to work through. He had seen similar sights growing up, but he had no idea what her issue was from their brief interactions and didn’t want to presume to know until he got her story from her.
- Writer
