It was late in the afternoon. The sun was about to set. Raymond lay asleep on his bed under a thin blanket. A noise outside his door woke him up. He groggily opened his eyes. Taking note of his surroundings, he concluded that someone must have brought him home. It must’ve been Lily. He felt dispirited when he gazed at the bandages wrapped around his left leg. His spirits further suffered when he confirmed his failure by checking his mana pool. Well, she predicted as much.

He slowly examined himself and was grateful to find that there was no swelling on his face or anywhere else for that matter. The feeling of nausea and a headache was at a manageable level. He silently thanked the beautiful Ingrid Beltran for doing such a good job of healing his injuries. After making sure all was well, considering, he let out a volley of curses at his fate for not awakening, even after that intense round of beating.

*Knock. Knock*

Rose entered the room before he could react to the noise, and came up to his bed.

“Shift,” she demanded and ordered him to make a place for her. Raymond rolled his eyes at her but quietly shifted to one side. She slipped inside his blanket and laid her head on the same pillow as him. Finally settled, she asked, “How are you feeling?”

Raymond was speechless by her actions. It had been years since they had shared the same bed. The last time they did this, he was fourteen-years old. He silently stared at her, waiting for an explanation.

“It must be alright if you are not whining,” Rose muttered, not meeting his gaze.

Raymond had half a mind to kick her out. Exasperated, he asked through gritted teeth, “is this some new way of gloating I’m unaware of?”

“Didn’t you want to know about the war between Kyrgstan and Zekovia? Miranda is busy. So….”

She isn’t busy. She just doesn’t want to talk to me. All his anger at Rose and her unreasonable actions vanished in an instant. And here I thought getting injured was an easy way to earn forgiveness from Miranda.  He inwardly laughed at his delusions.

Suddenly his eyes widened. He realized from her actions that Rose was actually here to apologize but was too embarrassed to do it. He turned towards her, rested his head on his hand, which was raised at the elbow, and he studied her face from above. There were obvious signs of discomfort. Her lips were puckered; her eyes danced around, stealing quick glances of his face from time to time.

Raymond was amused by her behavior. He thought about letting her stew for a while but couldn’t hold himself back from teasing her. “Is this how you apologize?” He grinned at her reddening face.

“Do you want to know or not?” Rose asked, baring her teeth at him.

He continued grinning. “Nah, who cares!?” he said after a little while, finally able to stifle his laughter.

She lifted her brows, looking surprised. “You really don’t want to know?”

Raymond just smiled at her. He felt relaxed for the first time in over a day. He realized he enjoyed this tranquil atmosphere, lying in the same bed with Rose doing nothing but gazing at her silently. He loathed to admit the fact that red was his color of choice. Ah, that red hair and those red eyes.

A bit bothered by the bangs covering her eyes, he subconsciously tucked them behind her ears. Satisfied, he stared at her red eyes. “So beautiful,” he whispered. He was lost in her eyes, unaware of his own actions as he tenderly caressed the contours of her face. He traced his finger over her lush, red eyebrows, her sharp nose, the edges of her beautiful oval face, her full red lips, and he stopped at her chin.

“Hehe, stop,” Rose giggled. “It tickles.”

Raymond jerked away in surprise, appalled at his actions. Oh My God. What is happening to me? It’s Rose. Rose. The Rose, you despise so much. He peeked at her face and panicked. Oh no. Her face is turning weird. Quick… distract her.

In his panic, he blurted out, “What happened to your boy? What’s his name again? Mae? Jay? Sorry, I tend to forget… there have been so many… wait, I remember now. Antonio. What happened to him?” Yes, this ought to distract her. Good job, me. He praised himself for the quick thinking.

“I dumped his ass,” Rose answered in an angry tone.

“Really?” He almost yelled in excitement.

She smiled mischievously and stared into his eyes. “Jealous?” she teased.

Raymond turned his head away in embarrassment. He never liked this line of questioning. In fact, being teased about his jealousy towards any of her boyfriends was one thing he wanted to avoid the most. Shit… shit... quickly… distract her again.

“So, who’s next? I met that Captain Fjord or whatever his name is today,” Raymond said, his head still turned the other way.

“Maybe… I don’t know. But I’ll tell you one thing, he’s definitely dreamy,” Rose murmured in a low airy voice.

His mood turned sour in an instant. All his excitement and panic went poof listening to Rose’s words about Corey Fjord. He never liked it when she talked about her boyfriends. And he was very grateful that he did not have to deal with this problem when it came to Miranda.

He was sure if she ever brought a boyfriend home or told him about finding someone, he would go apoplectic. And Lily, she was different from the rest. He believed she wasn’t even interested in anything other than magic and training. Figures. And just when I thought…

Raymond had realized after their spar that Rose had gone easy on him. She had not used body strengthening magic, and that was the only reason he could take her by surprise. If she had cast it, her reflexes would have drastically improved, and she could have easily parried his strike.

Ha… He sighed, some things never change…

“What’s that?” Raymond was interrupted before he could finish his thought. He looked at Rose, who excitedly jumped and fetched a letter from his dresser table. “It’s a letter, I think.” She quickly opened it without a care for his privacy.

“Sure. You can open it,” Raymond said with heavy sarcasm.

“It’s from Shania,” Rose muttered, almost an afterthought. She started grinning as she read on, growing to a lung bursting laugh by the end of it. “It’s a love letter,” she barely got out between her fits of laughter.

Raymond snatched the letter from her, confused by her crazy reaction to a simple love letter. His face turned red as he read about their recent tryst written in its full glory. There was a further mention of a repeat performance. By the end, the letter took on a grave tone, as if written by two different people. He read through a brief account of a family emergency and an apology for leaving abruptly. She promised to always keep him in her heart and hoped for the same from him.

“It’s a parting letter.” Raymond threw the crumpled letter towards the door.

Rose flicked a tiny ball of flame at the piece of parchment. “That fucking bitch… how dare she?!”

“Said there was some family emergency or something,” Raymond continued in the same dispassionate tone. He obviously didn’t believe a word of it. Most likely she found another opportunity or some other prince. He was not concerned either way.

“Good riddance. I never liked her anyway,” Rose huffed. The atmosphere suddenly turned tense. Raymond was once again reminded that, of all the girls in his family, none of them had liked Shania or any of his previous girlfriends for that matter. He always chalked it up to his own poor choices. Now, though, he couldn’t help but look back. Hmm, this is interesting. He tried to remember his past girlfriends. Now that I think about it, not all of them were so bad. Hmm. Maybe…he chuckled at the absurdity of it. Yeah, right. Like that would ever happen. He cursed at himself. Not everybody is a deviant like you.

“Then I’m going.”

“Huh, why?” Raymond asked.

Rose said while getting up, “Since you don’t care about politics…”

“I never said that…”

“So, do you really want to know?” Rose seemed taken aback by his change of mood. Raymond felt smug, as he had long guessed that she hadn’t wanted to really explain it. And he just didn’t want to give her an easy way out of apologizing.

“It’s fine even if you can’t tell me… I’m sure it isn’t because you don’t know the reason.” He smirked; he loved it when she squirmed a little.

“Humph.” She snorted at his antics. “I can’t say for sure, but there is a chance the Eastern Continent is behind this affair,” She remarked, her eyes glaring straight at him, daring him to ask any more about it.

Raymond asked, “The Eastern Continent?” His tone was skeptical. They both gazed at each other before guffawing at the same moment. “The fucking barbarians!”

The Eastern Continent, which was the continent to the east of the continent of Paschwes, was commonly referred to as the Barbarian Land by the people of Paschwes. Apart from the folk tales and songs, there wasn’t much mention of it in the general populace. There were rumors about a war being fought in the distant past, but nobody took it seriously, and believed it to be a grandma’s tale for children.

Raymond had never seen a native of the Eastern Continent, but there was only disdain for them and their barbaric ways, in his mind.

“Just tell me one thing. How do you know so much? Do all of you have secret meetings behind my back?” Raymond impatiently asked the one thing which had bothered him since the afternoon. He always believed himself to be smarter than Rose. He could swallow his defeat at her hands if they used magic, but he could never take being outwitted by her.

Rose turned around, a mysterious smile on her face. She slowly lifted her finger to her lips, “Secret meetings…are secret,” she whispered in a throaty voice. Winking at him seductively, she skipped out of the room.

Raymond’s heart thumped out of his chest; he couldn’t believe how sexy she looked and sounded.  I don’t think I can survive all these surprise attacks to my heart. He let out a weary sigh. Ha…I should just get some sleep.