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Glory to my bum ass proofreader: Solare.
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Marika's laughter followed him down the corridor like warm gold chiming through the back of his mind.
"Thou art a romantic fool." She said, still openly amused.
John adjusted the impossible weight of the bouquet in his arms and kept walking with the kind of stubborn dignity only a man carrying half the floral life of the Lands Between could muster.
"Call me whatever you like, I'm doing this." He murmured.
"Okay, okay~! Do as thou wishest~!" Marika purred, every word drenched in delight.
That only made her laugh harder, because John was very much doing this. He had committed himself fully to the bit, and now there was no backing out without shame.
Not that he wanted to.
The bouquet tucked against his chest was so absurdly elaborate that it circled right back around from ridiculous to sincere, which was exactly the sort of line John specialized in walking.
The poor vendor in the Roundtable market had looked at him like he'd gone mad when he asked for every flower kind the man knew of. At first the merchant had assumed John meant every flower currently on display.
Then John clarified that he meant every flower the man could get his hands on from anywhere in the Lands Between, and the poor bastard's face had gone through three different stages of professional distress before settling on a kind of hollow acceptance.
Things had only gotten worse when John shoved ten thousand runes into his soul pouch and told him to stop looking haunted and start looking useful.
To the man's credit, he had produced results.
Now John carried a great, layered bouquet that looked as if a botanist, a perfumer, and a mildly unwell noble had all collaborated under battlefield conditions.
Closest to the front were Erdleaf Flowers from Limgrave, simple pale blossoms with soft green-white petals that looked gentle enough to bruise under the wrong touch. They were common around roadsides and ruined churches, and the vendor had charged only about forty runes for a thick handful.
Mixed among them were Golden Sunflowers, broad-faced and warm as spilled sunlight, likely brought in from the Altus Plateau or old gardens beneath the Erdtree's reach. Those had gone for around one hundred and twenty runes for a few good stems, while the Tarnished Golden Sunflowers, faded and dustier in their beauty, had been cheaper by half.
He had insisted on Altus Blooms too, because their rich yellow petals almost looked like they were still holding onto the warmth of a different sky. Those had cost more, somewhere around a hundred runes for a small bundle, and the vendor had muttered that transport, not rarity, was the real thief there.
Fire Blossoms had come next, red and ember-tipped, their scent carrying a subtle heat beneath the sweetness. They were gathered from harsher country where flame and fertile soil met, and the merchant had charged accordingly. Fulgurbloom followed, bright and vivid as trapped lightning, their yellow petals looking almost too alive to be real. Even John had to admit those were worth the inflated price.
The lilies had nearly made the merchant cross himself.
Miquella's Lilies rested near the center of the arrangement like small, sacred things, pale and luminous in a way that did not belong to ordinary flowers. Trina's Lilies had a softer presence, washed in violet and silver, their dreamy beauty almost sleepy in its gentleness.
Crystal Buds and Rimed Crystal Buds had been worked into the bouquet as well, giving it little splashes of cold blue and frost-white that caught the light like frozen breath.
Even Bloodroses had made it in, their velvety crimson petals and heavy metallic sweetness standing out among the softer scents, along with a few more dubious additions the merchant had only included because John had repeated, three times, that he wanted every flower kind.
Grave Violets, Poisonblooms were wrapped carefully away from the rest, and a few tiny blossoms that might once have been sold to him as "butterfly flowers" with more confidence than evidence.
The whole thing had probably cost two thousand runes in flowers and eight thousand more in panic, bribery, and making sure nobody asked him whether he was planning a confession, a proposal, or a funeral.
Still, as he brought the bouquet a little closer and breathed in, he decided it had all been worth it. His enhanced senses nearly got flattened by the rush of fragrance that hit him all at once. Sweetness tangled with earthy damp, clean floral perfume caught on spice and smoke, and the cold crispness of crystal blooms slid beneath the sleepy haze of lilies.
It should have been too much, but somehow it all settled into something wild and glorious instead. The scent clung to him as he walked, and even though it was almost absurdly overwhelming, it did nothing to slow the giddy excitement pounding in his chest.
He could already picture Melina's reaction, and that thought alone was enough to make his heart feel too big for his ribs.
He passed the doors of the rooms he assumed had gone to Solaire and Millicent. One of them had the faint sound of movement behind it, though whether that meant the Sunbro was awake and praising the dawn or Millicent was already up and causing problems, John couldn't say.
When he reached the room he and Melina shared, he shifted the bouquet into one arm, unlocked the door, and stepped quietly inside.
The bed was empty.
That made him pause for a second, but only until he heard the steady hiss of water from the bathroom. His eyes flicked toward the shut door, and his mind, ever eager to betray him, immediately painted him a very clear and very distracting mental image of Melina on the other side of it.
He stood there for one long moment, bouquet in hand, wrestling with the temptation to abandon romance in favor of improvised round two.
In the end, just barely, his better instincts won.
He wanted to surprise her properly, and he knew that if he walked into that bathroom, whatever happened after would not involve flowers.
So he waited.
The next five minutes were spent trying to make himself look less like a man who had sprinted halfway across Limgrave, extorted a flower merchant, met with a dangerous sorceress, and returned to his lover's room vibrating with smug anticipation.
He set the bouquet down long enough to drag his fingers through his hair and attempt some kind of order. He straightened the collar of his shirt, smoothed the front of it, checked the fall of his sleeves, and decided that presentable was a flexible enough standard to work with.
Once he was satisfied, or at least out of patience, he picked the bouquet back up and hid it behind his back just as the water cut off.
The bathroom door opened a minute later.
Melina stepped out in a fluffy bathrobe tied snugly at the waist, a smaller towel resting around her neck. Damp brown hair spilled over one shoulder in soft, dark strands, and the lingering warmth of the bath had painted a gentle flush across her skin.
She looked rested in a way he had rarely seen from her before, and whatever lingering excess of mana she was carrying made her seem a touch brighter around the edges, as though she had been polished from within.
She then saw him.
The blush that touched her face was immediate, soft at first and then deepening when memory clearly caught up to her. That fluster lasted only a heartbeat before she rallied and drew herself up into a tiny, offended pout that was so painfully cute it nearly knocked the laugh right out of him.
She turned away from him with exaggerated dignity and folded her arms.
"I am angry with you."
John bit down on the smile threatening to spread too quickly.
"Are you?"
"Yes." She kept her face angled away from him, though he noticed her eye shift ever so slightly in his direction. "You promised you would return before I woke. You did not. Therefore, I am angry."
"That does sound pretty bad."
"It was."
"So should I run?"
"You should go away."
He chuckled softly, because there was no actual heat in it, only the kind of wounded insistence that wanted to be soothed and had already halfway decided to allow it.
"I'm sorry…" He whispered, and he meant it enough that the teasing in his tone softened around the edges. "Will you at least let me make it up to you?"
"No."
She held the line admirably. She did not turn. She did not ask anything. She only shooed him away with one hand, and even that lost some of its force when her curiosity got the better of her and she cut him a brief side glance.
That was all the invitation he needed.
John's smile widened, and with as much showmanship as he could reasonably justify, he drew the bouquet out from behind his back and offered it to her with both hands.
Melina froze.
The change in her was immediate and impossible to miss. Her eye widened, her lips parted ever so slightly, and the annoyance she had been clinging to with such determination simply stopped mattering for a second.
She looked from the flowers to him and back again, and the happiness rising in her face came too fast and too honestly for her to smother it in time.
She tried. He saw her try.
But whatever defensive irritation she had arranged for herself crumbled under the weight of the gesture, and what broke through in its place was a bright, almost disbelieving smile that made something warm twist pleasantly in his chest.
She looked up at him at once, as if catching him witness it might somehow help her recover lost ground. The expression she turned on him was magnificently compromised: annoyed in theory, blushing in practice, and betrayed entirely by the smile she still could not get rid of.
John waited, because he was enjoying this far too much.
And when she still didn't move, he let his shoulders dip in theatrical disappointment.
"Oh~? Then I suppose I misjudged the situation. My mistake. I thought you might like them."
Her eye narrowed at him, but she said nothing.
"That's on me…" He continued mournfully. "I'm sorry for disappointing you."
He began to draw the bouquet back, but he did not get far.
Melina moved with startling speed, snatching the flowers out of his hands before he could fully retract them. The bouquet vanished against her chest, and she turned away so fast it was obvious she could not bear to meet his face while he was looking that pleased with himself.
John laughed then, because there was simply nothing else to do.
Melina ignored him with the practiced focus of a woman trying very hard not to seem delighted while being entirely delighted. She lifted the bouquet closer and examined it properly. Her fingers brushed over the petals with almost reverent care.
She drew the blooms up toward her face and inhaled, slowly and deeply, and as she did, the tension left her shoulders. The smile that spread over her mouth after that was wide and a little shaky, as though she still hadn't fully processed that the bouquet was real and in her hands.
For several long moments she simply admired it, turning it slightly to take in the different flowers, their colors, and their scents.
John watched all of it in silence, too fond by half and not remotely interested in saving himself from the consequences. By the time she turned back toward him, some treacherous part of her had clearly forgotten she was supposed to be maintaining a principled grievance.
Until she saw his expression.
His face was openly smug, yes, but beneath that there was laughter and far too much tenderness, and Melina seemed to understand quickly that he had seen everything she had been trying to hide.
Color flooded her cheeks again.
"...I shall let it go this one time." Melina muttered as she turned away so quickly it nearly looked like a flinch.
That only made him laugh harder.
She tried to hide her face from him after that, but the effort was useless. Even turned away, she was still flushed, and the smile she kept trying to suppress remained curled helplessly at the corner of her mouth while she clutched the bouquet to her chest like something precious.
From the back of his mind, Marika was openly cackling.
And John, romantic fool that he was, decided on the spot that every rune, every second of waiting, and every ounce of florist-induced suffering had been completely justified for the privilege of seeing Melina look like this.
In the end, Melina made up with him in the only way that really mattered.
She lingered by the bouquet for a little while longer, pretending she was still deciding whether to forgive him while very obviously already forgiven.
John watched her arrange the flowers with a care bordering on reverence, setting them near the spectral window where the false light of the Erdtree could pour over the petals and catch in the pale lilies, the crystal buds, and the warm gold of the sunflowers.
For a moment she simply stood there with her back to him, one hand lightly adjusting a stem that did not need adjusting, and he could see from the set of her shoulders that she was trying to gather what remained of her dignity before turning around.
It did not help her much.
When she finally faced him again, there was still color in her cheeks, and the fondness in her eye had long since ruined any real attempt at severity. She took two measured steps toward him as though she meant to say something composed, something maidenly and dry and perfectly controlled.
Instead, the moment she reached him, she caught the front of his shirt in one hand, rose onto her toes, and kissed him with enough sudden force to make him blink.
John made a startled sound into her mouth, then laughed against her lips a second later when he realized what she was doing. Melina, apparently unwilling to let him get too pleased with himself over that realization, kissed him harder.
That was all the permission he needed.
His hands slid to her waist on instinct, then farther, settling beneath the soft fabric of her robe where it curved over her hips and lower. When he lifted, she came up easily.
One small gasp escaped her, but instead of protesting, she melted into it at once and let him pull her fully against him. Her legs tucked in close to his body, and the kiss deepened with immediate, dangerous enthusiasm as she hooked both arms around his neck.
A low, throaty moan slipped out of her then, soft enough that someone farther than a few feet away might have missed it.
John definitely did not miss it.
His grip on her ass tightened on reflex, one hand spread broad beneath her, the other bracing her close as if he had any intention of letting her go anytime soon. She felt impossibly light to him now, almost insubstantial for all how real and warm she was in his hands.
The only reason he stumbled back at all was surprise. Melina had thrown her full weight into the kiss with a kind of sleepy, hungry commitment that caught him half a beat off guard, and he gave ground laughing under his breath as she kept kissing him like she meant to win some private argument she had been carrying since waking.
His back found the wall, and that only seemed to encourage her.
The soft bathrobe bunched under his fingers as Melina pressed herself closer, kissing him with a neediness that was somehow still recognizably hers. She was not graceful about it in the way a practiced seductress might have been.
There was too much earnestness in it, too much unfiltered want wrapped in shyness and recent courage. John found that infinitely more dangerous.
So he indulged her completely.
His mouth met hers with equal heat, and when his hands squeezed a little more firmly where they held her, the sinful sound that came out of her this time went right through him. Melina shivered against him, fingers tightening at the back of his neck as if she wanted to anchor herself there.
The kiss turned slower and deeper after that, and they both all but forgot about the world outside of that room.
At some point her towel slipped loose from around her neck and fell soundlessly to the floor. At another, one side of her robe loosened enough beneath his wandering hand that he felt warm skin where fabric had been.
He could feel the frantic beat of her heart through the robe, feel the slight tremor in her breath each time she came up for one thin half-breath and then dove right back in before either of them could say anything remotely sensible.
Marika, to her great credit, said absolutely nothing.
That silence told him she was either being merciful for once or too scandalized to form words. He did not dare check which.
By the time they finally broke apart, it had been long enough that John's sense of time had gone pleasantly strange. Melina was the one who gave in first, though only because her lungs forced the issue.
She pulled back by fractions, lips still chasing his once or twice before she fully separated, and then she just stayed there in his arms, breathing hard.
The sight of her nearly made him start all over again.
Her face was flushed bright crimson, her visible eye hazy and unfocused in a way that made it look almost glazed. A trail of spit still connected their mouths for one indecent second before snapping, and the way she blinked after that, slow and dazed, made it very clear that coherent thought had been left somewhere behind around minute two.
John chuckled softly.
He shifted his grip just enough to hold her more comfortably and brushed his nose once against her cheek.
"Well~..." He murmured, still a little breathless himself despite how unfairly much stamina he now had. "...you satisfied?"
Melina's answer was not immediate.
For a moment she only panted, one hand flattening weakly against his chest as though trying to remember where the ground was. She gave a tiny, dazed nod and let out the softest, most airy little sound he had ever heard from her.
"Uh… uh-huh…"
He laughed again, lower this time, and felt the frantic pace of her heartbeat begin, very slowly, to settle.
Her eye focused by degrees. Thought returned behind it in visible layers, along with the awareness of where she was, how she was being held, and what exactly she had just allowed herself to do in broad morning light against a wall because he brought her flowers and smiled too smugly.
That realization hit all at once.
Melina made a small mortified noise, buried her face briefly against his shoulder, and then pulled back enough to try and look stern. The attempt was badly undermined by her swollen lips, her flushed skin, and the way her breathing still hitched every few seconds.
"J-Johnathan…" She stuttered, then had to stop and clear her throat before trying again. "L-Let me down."
The stammer alone nearly killed him.
"As my princess commands~ ."
He lowered her carefully, setting her back onto her feet with more gentleness than the situation technically required. Melina immediately fussed with the front of her robe, dragging the loosened side closed and retightening the sash around her waist with quick, embarrassed hands.
Her hair, which had still been damp from the bath, now looked even more disheveled than before, and the flush in her cheeks did not seem interested in going anywhere soon.
John, because he had no survival instinct at all where she was concerned, reached up and fixed one stray lock for her.
That only made her blush harder.
"D-Do not look at me l-like that…" She muttered, not quite meeting his eyes.
"Like what?"
"Like…" She faltered, then frowned faintly when she realized she had no good answer. "Like you are p-pleased with yourself…"
"I mean…" He said reasonably. "I am~."
She huffed, though the sound lacked all real force, and bent to retrieve the fallen towel from the floor. When she straightened, he could see that some of the dreamy haze had finally left her expression and been replaced by that familiar dry composure she wore like a second skin.
Only this time it sat a little looser on her, but it pleased him more than he could have explained.
"All right…" He said, giving her one last once-over and deciding she was roughly back in one piece. "Should we go pretend to be functional people?"
Melina tied the towel neatly around her neck again, then looked over at the bouquet by the window before returning her gaze to him.
"Yes, the others are almost certainly waiting for us."
John smoothed his shirt and checked that his hair was no longer in outright rebellion. Melina adjusted the robe one final time, then disappeared briefly into the dressing alcove to return with a more proper outfit for walking through the Hold without immediately informing everyone who looked at her what sort of morning she'd had.
When she reemerged, composed once more if not entirely unflusterable, John offered her his arm with exaggerated gravity.
"Milady."
She stared at it, before turning to him with a softness that did dangerous things to his heart, she slipped her hand around his arm anyway.
Together, they left the room and made for the dining hall, both of them fully aware that whatever waited there was almost certainly going to include breakfast, interrogation, and at least one gremlin with entirely too much insight into their private lives.
As they walked, John glanced sideways at her and caught the faint pink still lingering in her cheeks, at which point his mouth started to curl again.
Melina noticed immediately.
"Do not." She warned.
"I didn't even say anything."
"You were about to."
He considered lying, then thought better of it. "Fair."
They walked in companionable silence for a little while after that, her hand looped around his arm and the scent of her flowers still faintly clinging to both of them. The Hold, for all its timeless strangeness, was already fully awake.
Tarnished and attendants moved through its halls with the low, steady rhythm of a fortress between campaigns. Somewhere farther off, someone was arguing over boots. Somewhere else, a woman laughed too loudly at something probably unfunny.
The familiar murmur of the place rolled through the corridors like a second atmosphere.
When they neared the smithery, the sound of hammer on metal rose to meet them.
Master Hewg stood bent over his anvil as always, his massive frame hunched under chains and old burdens alike, hammer rising and falling with the same terrible patience he seemed to apply to all things.
The forge-fire painted his scarred body in deep orange and gold, throwing hard shadows across the cramped space and making the runes scored into heated metal flare like captive stars.
John stepped up to the threshold and cleared his throat.
"Morning, Hewg."
The smith did not look up immediately. He finished the strike he was in the middle of, dipped the glowing length of metal into a trough with a hiss, then finally turned his head enough to glare at John from beneath that heavy brow.
"Morning?" Hewg rumbled. "You bring me scrap twisted like a drunkard's spine, blades chipped to shit, and a standard caked in enough blood to drown a kennel, and you've the stones to call it mornin' like we're old friends in a courtyard?"
John winced and Melina, traitorously, made no effort whatsoever to hide the amusement in her eye.
Hewg turned fully then and reached behind the forge bench. One by one, he hauled John's gear up and laid it out.
The zweihander came first, cleaned and repaired so expertly that it looked almost offended to be associated with the state John had brought it in. The edge had been restored, the warping in the blade's body corrected, and the whole thing now held that quiet, dangerous stillness only truly well-made steel ever managed.
Then came the massive slab of metal John mentally categorized as his Ultra Greatsword, brutal and ugly in all the right ways, but now newly reinforced along old stress lines Hewg had apparently refused to tolerate.
The two uchigatanas followed, both polished, rewrapped, and sharpened to that predatory glimmer katana steel got when someone who actually knew what they were doing had handled it.
Finally, Hewg lifted the Commander's Standard and planted its butt against the stone floor hard enough to make it ring.
"Do you have any idea what kind of beast abuses weapons like this?" The smith growled.
John opened his mouth but Hewg smacked him upside the head with the flat of one thick, soot-darkened hand before he could answer.
The hit was not particularly damaging. It was, however, loud. John recoiled on instinct and clapped a hand to the back of his skull.
"Ow! What the hell?!"
"That was for the zweihander."
Before John could protest, the smith cuffed him again.
"And that was for the katanas."
A third blow followed, this one more of a heavy shove to the side of the head than a strike.
"And that was for whatever in the rotten depths you did to the standard."
Melina covered her mouth and looked away, shoulders shaking faintly. And Marika, lounging invisible just beyond the forge-fire, looked delighted.
John straightened slowly and did the only sensible thing available to him.
He bowed his head.
"I am deeply, sincerely, and catastrophically sorry."
"You should be." Hewg grunted and launched into the full sermon.
He explained, in detail and at alarming volume, exactly what happens when a man uses greatswords to block impacts they were never meant to block, lets blood crust into fittings, chips katana edges on armored targets like he's trying to carve masonry, and swings polearms hard enough to warp wood and metal together under repeated battlefield strain.
John stood there and took it, mostly because he knew he deserved it.
And also because every time he tried to look appropriately ashamed, he caught Melina's eye and found her enjoying this far too much.
"And another thing." Hewg snapped, jabbing a thick finger toward the lined-up blades. "A weapon's not just some bloody extension of your arm to throw at whatever moves. You care for it, it cares for you. You leave it in filth, cracked and strained, you'll find it failing you when you need it most."
"I know, I know."
"No, you don't."
"I'm beginning to."
"You'll maintain them." Hewg ordered, voice dropping into something lower and more dangerous. "You'll wipe them down after use. You'll check the edge before and after battle. You'll respect the work that went into them. And if you bring me something in that state again, I'll break your spine over the anvil instead of fixing the blade."
John nodded solemnly. "Sir, yes sir!"
Melina laughed quietly at that, it made Hewg's mouth twitch, though the smith immediately crushed it back down into his usual glower.
Marika was no better.
"She enjoys thy suffering."
'So do you.'
"Aye. But I am honest about it."
Once Hewg had fully exhausted his outrage and John had apologized three more times with increasing sincerity, the smith finally waved a thick, dismissive hand. "Take your damn tools and get the hell out of my forge."
John did so with immediate obedience, gathering his repaired weapons into his inventory with visible relief.
"Oh, and Roderika's in the dining hall." Hewg added gruffly, as if remembering it annoyed him that he remembered. "Went off early. Said she'd likely find your lot there."
"Thanks, Hewg."
The smith gave him a look, and John corrected himself at once.
"Master Hewg."
"That's better."
Melina inclined her head politely.
"Thank you for your work."
Hewg grunted again, which from him counted as gracious acknowledgment, then turned back to the forge after unilaterally deciding the conversation was over.
John and Melina made their escape.
The walk to the dining hall was shorter than John would have liked, because the warmth of their room and the easy humor lingering between them had made him unreasonably content. Still, by the time they reached the hall, the smell of food had started reminding him that he had, in fact, sprinted through half the morning on very little besides smugness and floral romance.
The dining hall was already lively.
It wasn't rowdy, exactly, but full enough that the sound of utensils, conversation, and shifting chairs blended into a comfortable hum. Roderika sat near the center of one long table with a small mug in both hands, posture neat and expression brightening immediately the moment she spotted them.
Millicent lounged nearby with all the casual insolence of a woman who had absolutely no intention of letting either of them sit down unharassed. Solaire sat opposite them with a plate large enough to qualify as a civic project, his helm angled toward some animated internal monologue about either the sun or breakfast.
All three looked up.
Millicent's grin turned feral almost instantly.
"Well, well~..." She drawled. "Look who finally rejoined the land of the living."
Melina's hand tightened very slightly around John's arm.
Roderika, in contrast, looked genuinely happy.
"Good morning!" She said, then immediately blushed a little, perhaps remembering everything from last night all at once. "I mean– ah… good morning, both of you."
Solaire placed one gauntleted hand over his chest and beamed.
"Friend Johnathan! Lady Melina! Splendid to see you both hale and radiant this morn. There is a certain… ah… glow of victory about the pair of you."
Millicent barked a laugh. "Yeah, they sure 'tied it down', all right."
"That phrase sounds vaguely threatening when you say it." John muttered as he slid into his seat with exaggerated calm.
"Everything sounds vaguely threatening when I say it, Johnny."
Roderika folded her hands and smiled shyly.
"Still… congratulations." She said, and there was such simple, earnest warmth in it that neither John nor Melina had a decent defense. "You both looked very happy last night."
Melina's face went pink again.
John, for his part, nodded with mock gravity. "Thank you. We suffered greatly to achieve this outcome."
Millicent snorted so hard she nearly choked.
Solaire laughed with the full-body enthusiasm of a man who thought romance was as noble as jolly cooperation.
"It is a fine thing to see two souls draw close amid such darkened times! Why, it does the heart good!"
Millicent propped her chin on one hand and eyed the pair of them with obscene amusement.
"So, next time you two decide to vanish for the night, maybe invite me along."
There was a beat as Melina made a small, scandalized sound.
"I'm kidding~..." Millicent placated, lifting a hand lazily, though her grin sharpened slightly a moment later. "...Mostly."
John laughed. Melina looked like she wanted to crawl under the table and set it on fire at the same time. Roderika turned scarlet on impact, while Solaire, who had perhaps decided not to fully parse the comment for the preservation of his own peace, drank from his cup with diplomatic determination.
Food arrived quickly after that, or rather, John realized it had already been there waiting for them. Bread still warm from the ovens. Thick stew. Roasted meat. Soft fruit. Something sweet that might once have aspired to pastry before dying bravely in the kitchens. He ate with the focus of a man who had burned through a long morning and intended to reclaim those calories by force.
Conversation loosened around the table after the first hunger was dealt with.
Roderika asked after his walk, though John gave her the simplified answer rather than the full version involving witch recruitment and magical geology. Solaire described the dawn from one of the Hold's upper arches in the same tone another man might use for a divine revelation. Millicent stole from John's plate twice and got away with it both times because he was too busy drinking.
Eventually, once enough of the meal had disappeared and everyone looked more functional, Millicent leaned back in her chair and cut through the comfortable atmosphere with the practical question.
"All right. Where are we going next?"
John wiped his mouth, set his cup down, and let a smirk spread slowly across his face.
"Liurnia of the Lakes, obviously."
Solaire looked between them.
"Liurnia…" He repeated. "The name is oft spoken here with a curious blend of reverence and caution. I know only that it lies beyond Stormveil and that its waters are deep with history. What should I expect, my friends?"
Melina answered before John could get clever.
"Liurnia is the great lake-region north of Limgrave." She said, slipping naturally into the cadence of explanation. "Much of its lower land flooded long ago, and many of its roads, villages, and churches now stand half-drowned. Travel there is difficult for the unprepared."
Solaire listened intently as she continued on.
"It is also the domain of Raya Lucaria Academy, or was, before the region fractured. The Academy rose to prominence as the great seat of glintstone learning, while the Carian Royal Family ruled from the manor in the north with their own lunar traditions and sorceries. Those powers once stood opposed, then later joined through Queen Rennala."
John nodded along, chewing.
"And then everything went to hell." He added helpfully.
Melina gave him a flat look, but continued.
"The Shattering broke what remained of that unity. Liurnia now is beautiful, dangerous, and unstable. The Academy isolates itself. The royal line is diminished. The roads are haunted. The water hides all manner of things."
Solaire placed a hand to his chest. "Marvelous."
"That's your reaction to literally every place described as dangerous." Millicent teased with a grin.
"Danger and wonder often share a border, Lady Millicent." John declared as he pointed at him with his spoon.
"That's actually pretty solid."
Melina exhaled softly through her nose and looked back to Solaire. "The Great Rune we seek lies there as well. The Great Rune of the Unborn remains with Rennala, Queen of the Full Moon."
Solaire's helm tilted.
"The Unborn…" He said slowly. "A strange title."
"It is stranger in practice." Melina said.
John leaned back and folded his arms.
"Whatever it turns out to be, it's ours next."
That statement sat over the table for a moment, simple and bold enough that nobody challenged it.
Millicent smiled like she'd been waiting to hear exactly that.
Roderika looked a little nervous, but there was trust in it too now. She had seen him do the impossible enough times that the next impossibility had begun to sound merely ambitious rather than absurd.
Solaire placed both hands on the table and rose with theatrical conviction. "Then let us not keep destiny waiting."
John stood too. "Agreed."
The others followed.
There was a quick flurry of practical preparation after that. Weapons checked. Cloaks adjusted. Remaining food finished or abandoned. Roderika wished them luck and promised she would remain at the Hold for now, where she could help with spirit tuning and keep out of the direct path of whatever catastrophe John was about to trigger next. John squeezed her shoulder gently on the way past, earning a small smile from her.
With the Hold's Grace answering at Melina's call, the world bent around them once more. Golden light climbed around their feet, wind stirring cloaks and hair as the dining hall dissolved into spirals of gold and pale fire.
In the next heartbeat, they stood once more within Stormveil Castle.
The damage remained, of course. Stone still bore cracks from battle, and the smell of old fire clung to some of the walls. But Edgar's men and Stormveil's surrendered soldiers had already begun the work of transformation.
Broken barricades had been cleared. New banners hung where Godrick's sigils once did, Morne's crest now intertwined with John's growing emblem. Courtyards that had run red were busy instead with labor, direction, repair, and the rough beginnings of order.
Solaire looked around with visible appreciation. "It wears victory well."
John rolled one shoulder and grinned toward the distant northern rise of the castle. "Come on, Liurnia's waiting."
Beyond Stormveil's high reaches lay the path north, and beyond that path spread the flooded expanse of a new land, ancient and drowned and glittering with sorcery. Somewhere out there sat Raya Lucaria. Somewhere beyond its walls waited Rennala and the Great Rune of the Unborn.
John led them out from Stormveil's inner courtyard at an easy pace, the morning still cool and pale around them. The castle was awake now in full, with soldiers moving along the walls, laborers hauling timber, and banners snapping in the breeze where Godrick's leering sigils had already begun disappearing beneath newer colors.
They had not gone far before Edgar and Irina met them along one of the upper paths.
"Milord!" Edgar called at once, straightening despite the faint stiffness in his gait. "And Lady Melina, Lady Millicent, Sir Solaire. You honor us early."
Irina smiled brightly when she saw John, stepping lightly to her father's side. "Good morning, Lord Johnathan."
Melina returned the greeting with all proper courtesy, and a very small stink eye.
It was subtle, the sort of thing only someone already watching for it would catch. Her gaze lingered on Irina for the briefest second too long, no doubt remembering that stolen kiss from two days ago. She had, mostly, let it go.
Mostly.
But John caught it, and so did Marika. And both of them found it deeply amusing.
Irina, blissfully unaware, only kept smiling.
John raised a hand in greeting. "Morning, Edgar. Sorry, but we're only passing through. We're heading north to Liurnia. You got a map or two handy?"
Edgar nodded immediately, already turning half away as he beckoned to a nearby retainer. "Of course, my lord. We gathered every workable chart of the region we could salvage from Stormveil's stores. Give me but a moment."
It took less than that. Within minutes, Edgar had produced two rolled maps, one older and more weathered, the other newer and inked with practical notes in the margins. John accepted them with visible approval.
"Perfect, thanks."
Edgar bowed his head. "It is nothing."
John tucked the maps under one arm, then added, "Oh, and have a horse readied for Solaire, yeah? Something sturdy enough to survive him."
Solaire put a hand to his chest in mock offense. "Friend Johnathan, I have ridden many noble beasts in my time!"
Millicent snorted. "That sentence somehow did not reassure me."
Edgar hid a smile behind his beard and bowed once more. "It shall be done at once, milord."
John clapped him lightly on the shoulder. "Good man. We'll talk later."
Farewells followed quickly after that. Irina waved as they moved on, Melina's expression smoothing back into its usual calm the moment the girl turned away. John said nothing, because saying anything would absolutely get him stabbed.
They continued toward the northern side of the castle while John and the others opened the maps between them, slowing now and then whenever someone pointed something out.
Millicent was the first to lean in with real interest. "Huh… Lots of ruins. Lots of water. Looks annoying."
"It will be." Melina said. "Liurnia's lower roads are difficult to traverse. Many lie beneath the flood."
John traced a finger along one inked route and nodded at a cave mark near the western side of the lake. "Lakeside Crystal Cave should be hiding something interesting."
Millicent tilted her head. "You say that like you already know."
"I usually do!" John said cheerfully.
Solaire peered over his shoulder at the map with great knightly seriousness. "And where first, then?"
John's finger moved farther south-west, toward a little scribbled village mark tucked against the cliffs. "Village of the Albinaurics. That's our first stop."
Melina's eye narrowed slightly at the name thoughtfully. She did not question him.
From there they left the main upper walkways and passed through one of Stormveil's lesser-known side routes, the sort of narrow stone cut and hidden gate that had likely been meant for retreats, smuggling, or quietly dishonorable business. It opened at last onto the outer northern rise of the castle.
And there Liurnia revealed itself.
John stopped. Even knowing it was coming, even remembering the game, the real sight still hit him.
Liurnia of the Lakes spread out below them in a vast silver-blue world of water, mist, and distant stone. The floodplains shimmered beneath the morning sky like a broken mirror stretching almost to the horizon, with drowned roads and half-sunken ruins threading through it in pale lines and dark silhouettes.
Islands of higher ground rose here and there from the lake-country like forgotten altars, crowned by dead trees, village roofs, or the leaning remains of towers consumed slowly by damp and time.
Far beyond, on the far eastern rise, the Academy of Raya Lucaria stood over the lake on its great rocky perch, blue-glinting and immense, all spires and arcane dignity, its silhouette more severe and beautiful than he remembered. The morning mist drifted around it in long white veils, making it look less built and more conjured into the world by some scholar's obsession.
To the north, the land climbed into gentler green heights and old manors half-swallowed by distance. To the west, cliffs ran long and jagged, patched with scrub and cave-mouth darkness. Everywhere water caught the early light and gave it back softer.
It was bigger than the game had ever managed to convey, and more beautiful.
"Damn…" John breathed.
Solaire stepped up beside him and let out a low, genuine sound of admiration. "Magnificent."
Millicent whistled softly. "All right, yeah. That's pretty."
Even Melina stood quiet for a few moments, letting the scale of it wash over them.
They were still looking when a soldier approached at a respectful jog, leading a broad-shouldered horse saddled in Stormveil tack.
"For Sir Solaire." The man said, bowing.
Solaire lit up at once. "Ah! A noble steed!"
The horse, for its part, looked rowdy enough to have opinions about that.
Solaire mounted with the confidence of a man who either knew exactly what he was doing or had never once considered he could fail. He turned the beast in a broad arc and raised one hand.
"Then I shall range a while ahead and around, my friends! If the Sun bids so, I shall meet thee soon enough!" The horse gave a sharp, impatient toss of its head as Solaire laughed. "And don't you dare go Hollow!"
Then the animal surged off at a pace half a step shy of disaster, carrying him down the path in a heroic blur of gold, steel, and enthusiastic instability.
Millicent barked a laugh first.
John shook his head, grinning. "He's gonna get himself killed by transportation before any boss gets the chance."
"Not if the horse dies first." Millicent said.
They watched until Solaire vanished down the winding path, then turned back to their own road. John and the others had just begun stepping away together, already reaching mentally for the whistles and reins that would call Torrent and the others' steeds, when something prickled along John's skin.
He stopped.
A few paces ahead, Melina and Millicent continued before realizing he was no longer with them. They turned almost together.
"What is it?" Melina asked at once.
John's eyes narrowed.
"I…" He frowned, hand shifting instinctively toward his weapon. "Something's wrong."
The sky answered him as a low, familiar voice rolled out over the morning.
"I see thee, little Tarnished. Smouldering with thy meager flame... I shall have thee return what thou stole, a thousand fold!"
John's expression flattened.
"Oh, you've gotta be fuckin' kidding me–!"
A Golden Order sigil ignited beneath his feet.
He had barely half a second to move.
Golden light erupted above him as Margit, Fell Omen in false skin, came crashing down with his cane raised high. John ripped the Commander's Standard into his hands by instinct alone and barely got it up in time. The impact hit like a collapsing building as the ground beneath John shattered outward in a web of cracks.
Melina shouted his name. Millicent's hand had already gone to her blade.
Margit did not stop there. With a savage twist of force, he struck John away from them with the heft of his twisted tail, sending him skidding hard across broken stone toward the edge of the hill. A flash of gold followed as the Omen rushed after him, like wrath given form.
John dug his boots in, caught himself, and looked up with a grin that was equal parts exasperation and excitement.
"Go on ahead!" He called back over his shoulder. "I'll catch up when I'm done teaching this loser a lesson or two!"
"Johnathan–!" Melina began.
A growl answered her as Margit and John vanished together in a blinding flare of golden light, torn away from the hilltop in the wake of the Omen's fury.
Silence slammed down after them.
Melina and Millicent stood staring at the empty space where, one heartbeat ago, a Tarnished demigod and a king-hating Omen had been.
For a second, neither spoke.
Then Millicent threw her head back and barked out a laugh.
Melina exhaled slowly through her nose, one hand rising to her temple as if she could physically press down the headache he caused.
"That dumbass…" She muttered, staring at the place he had vanished. "He is going to get himself killed one day… And Mother will not be able to drag him back every time."
Millicent wiped at one eye, still grinning.
"Yeah, but if anyone can turn getting ambushed by Margit into a detour, it's Johnny."
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Author's Note:
Power stones, please~!
Remember when I said that John ragebaiting Morgott would have consequences? Yeah… Here we are! Hopefully Johnny Boy is ready~
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Next Chapter Title: (Interlude) The Misadventures of Millicent I.
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