The young prince stood by the arched window, gazing down at the medieval town below red brick roofs huddled tight, their shadows unnaturally sharp beneath an aberrant sun that hung too low and too bright in the sky.
Behind him, the castle's eastern wing rose in cheerful absurdity, its roofs glazed a bright, impossible blue like scattered gumdrops.
There was a gentle breeze forcing his short blonde hair to flutter and wave in the wind. His bright emerald eyes looked longingly at the blue clear sky. The room was neat and large magnificent and most of all luxurious.
A knock, sharp and deliberate.
He didn't turn. "Enter." Deep stable and loud enough to be heard across the room.
The door opened and closed with quiet precision.
Viola stepped inside. She never announced herself; her presence was announcement enough. Her blue eyes locked onto his back took a small breath small enough not to be noticeable but only when you are close enough.
"My prince."
Her voice was level, cool, the voice of a woman who had seen too much. She was older noticeably so scars faint on her forearms, authority carved into every line of her body.
She could have hid it instead she wore a T-shirt probably made of cotton allowing them to breathe.
Carefully walking towards him she looked around the room it was a bit too clean to be a young man's room. The cleaning maids were not allowed into their rooms.
"You are late."
She stopped a few inches from him.
"Training was set for the sixth bell. You are thirty minutes behind."
Auther smiled faintly, still facing outward. "That so?"
"Yes." Her tone cut clean. "And before you try to charm your way out of it," she took a little pause "don't."
He turned slowly, deliberately one step, then another, closing the distance until she could feel the warmth radiating from him. A calculated invasion.
Viola held her ground he just lifted her chin in response. Her cute face was now fully facing his unnaturally unblemished one.
She met his eyes without blinking hand steadily reaching for the hilt of her rapier. "There you go being inappropriate you royal filth."
"But you like the inappropriateness, you could have easily told a maid to bring me down to the arena, yet..."
"Stop with your little mind games!" A rapier edge was at his throat a pressure increase away from splitting him into two.
His smile deepened. "Are they working?"
"What do you think," The rapier drew blood.
The smugness faltered, just enough. He had to let go of her chin.
"You've been trying to get into my loins for three years, I do not plan to open my legs to you so stop it okay."
She pressed harder the rapier wanted to cut but couldn't, he felt it, she was holding back. Then just as suddenly she removed the rapier placing it back in it's hilt.
"In the arena," she murmured, "you'd already be dead ok."
His breath hitched barely audible, but she heard it.
"You're no fun," he said, voice lower now.
"I'm not paid to be fun," Viola replied, turning to face him again. "I'm paid to keep you alive long enough to wear the crown without dying to your own reckless desire."
He leaned in, emerald eyes dark. "Am I really going to ever wear that crown?"
"I don't know."
She turned for the door. The door closed with quiet finality.
"I swear one day that woman will kill me."
Later, they faced each other across the wide sand circle of the arena.
Both in training attire his loose, hers fitted, accentuating every lethal curve. Viola held her rapier low and ready. Auther gripped his blade with outward calm, but his knuckles were white.
He had been here before.
The memory surged, the weight of inevitable death.
Some few minutes ago they faced off for the first time same poses same windspeed if he could measure it.
"I will get you back for that instructor Viola."
"For what?" She answered looking at how messed up his stance was, she was teaching him basic battle stances and he was an egregiously bad student.
'How is this kid the son of the Phantasmal Blade he has not an ounce of swordsman in him.' She thought utterly disinterested in whatever he was saying.
"For this." He gestured to his throat covered with a small bandage.
"Try me," a small pause then a silent look at her clenched fist tension loosening "In fact I'll let you have the first three blows."
He could not even fathom how fast she moved how would he land a single blow. He just wanted to be a nuisance.
"Is commander Viola scared of little old me?" He said, he never called her commander that was why he did not understand her next reply.
"What did you call me?" She asked clutching at the wooden hilt till a crack noise could be heard a slight frown also accompanied it, Auther could not notice it.
"Commander Viola's ears can't hear, huh."
"I'm warning you stop calling me that or else something bad is going to happen."
"Her grip tightened until the wood of her practice rapier groaned. Auther, caught in his own rhythm, failed to notice the predatory, manic shift in her eyes as he continued to push."
Suddenly just as fast as it had started a sharp pain came from his neck looking down, he was looking at Viola who at the time had a murderous look in her eyes upside down, a sudden thud that was his body following suite.
He had just been split into two, Viola kept her rapier in the air looking distantly at something. He lost consciousness he was dead.
He was dumbfounded to open his eyes or something of the sort to see a bright light brighter that the sun could ever dream to be. Yet he was not blinded instead he felt at peace.
His body was there just immersed in a fluid maybe stardust it would fit the cosmic setting he found himself immersed in.
"Foolish mortal that was a relatively good life why did you in your terms fuck it up?"
A female voice sounded soft gentle and teasing.
"Who said that, where am I, Am I really dead?"
"You're quite a curious fellow but I can't answer most of those questions mostly for I do not know their answers. My name is Hopelys Starborn the primordial of Essence."
"Are you the bright thing I'm seeing?" he said taking a small moment to squint.
"That I do not know."
"Why didn't I come here when I died the first time?"
"Mortal is that really right? We could spend eternity talking about things but you are a bit pressed on time so I will only allow three questions," she said the light turning color from ethereal white to a dim blue.
'I could literally ask anything about anything I want to know?' He thought to himself
"Yes you could but now you only have two remaining." she spoke the light turning even dimmer.
Auther himself was terrified to learn that she could read his mind. He wanted to relax not ask anything inadvertently but that backfired when she interpreted a random thought of his as a question. He merely chose to keep mum.
"Already given up I didn't know a candidate can be this easy to kick down." She said, it was intentional she wanted him brimming with questions about candidates and he honestly was he just had somethin more important to ask.
"You know I know what you really want to ask, why don't you just do it?"
"Humble goddess.."
"Flattery does not work on me kid."
"I wish to ask for more opportunities to ask questions three is clearly not enough."
The dimming light flickered up intensified to levels unseen by him for it was the first time it actively blinded him.
"Insolent do you know how many Gods Kings concepts anomalies clamor for my wisdom wishing for just one chance but never getting it while you having three dare call me a miser."
'I repent for my insolence.' he thought.
"You have bored me enough you thing, I will cut straight to the point you need not die for huge shackles need to be placed on your strong feet."
"What burden do you speak off?"
"I am giving you the mercy of not hearing that question that is the last mercy afforded to you. You will know of it once you have met it, and I swear on my name it is eager to meet you."
He returned to his body, chills from a body previously split in two the words commander repeated for the last time. He could see Viola's feet thrust against the ground, her wooden rapier reaching for his neck.
He wanted to move he was too slow, it was quite an irony to be able to view all her motions in a slug like perspective but he was a billion times slower.
'I cannot die I don't want to meet that temperamental primordial again.' He willed himself but Viola was inevitable so was his third death.
He found himself screaming at his legs to move his head to duck anything to stop what was surely coming.
'Friend we will help you, for you helped us in the days of old when promises began.' something drifted into his ears a strange feeling permeating his body narrowly giving him the energy to arch his body backward avoiding Viola's swing.
'What the fuck was that? Crap she's about to counter I can't move... Friends I need our assistance again.' He thought he wanted to move.
He miraculously twisted his legs moving to the side Viola's swing hitting the stone parchment.
Though he was fine the ground not as lucky a huge crater formed simultaneously breaking her blade into splinters she still did not relent she was already above him closing his abdomen with her legs. Holding the broken blade above him.
His adrenaline and his other hormones made him pitch an ill timed tent, for some weird reason that snapped her out of her reverie.
Her eyes opened wide in astonishment trying to process all that was happening, quickly standing up looking at the crater beside Auther. She shook her head grappling her head in annoyance.
"…How do you want to be compensated so that this is never told to anyone else?"
He looked at the crater an inkling longer than when shocked his heart thumped loudly she could hear it. In a blink you'll miss it moment Viola saw a glint that wasn't lecherous she smirked too quickly for anyone to notice.
"I want to fight you while you are at my strength." That made her eyes dilate disbelief suspended in something else. Simply smiling.
"Alright brat but don't be shown up by a 45 year old hag."
After a long duel Viola lunged Auther dodged hit her hand with the hilt of his wooden sword disarming her. He had won somehow, though he looked more beat up that Viola.
In truth they resorted to a tally; Viola had won thirteen times while this was Auther's first time, maybe his last.
"That was a good game." Viola said looking at her third rapier on the ground her hand flustering with blisters and at Auther bloody, beat up yet smiling it felt genuine for some reason.
Auther stepped in until almost no space remained. Heat poured between them. He could smell her steel, sweat, woman.
"What are you doing stop it now I order you." She tried wanted to move back but couldn't.
The blade lifted her chin higher, exposing the frantic beat of her pulse.
"What does it look like Idiot?" He answered neck bending to meet her face lips parting desperate to kiss him.
Her lips parted. A flush rose on her throat, spreading downward.
"You know I could end this I could end you."
"I know." His gaze dropped to her mouth. "You haven't."
Her free hand rose not to disarm, but to fist in his tunic, pulling him fractionally closer.
The kiss was fire.
Slow, deliberate, his mouth claiming hers with patient hunger. He tasted her resistance, want. His tongue slid against hers, coaxing, demanding. She made a soft, involuntary sound that went straight to his blood.
Her body arched faintly toward him, breasts pressing against his chest through thin fabric. He felt her nipples, hard and straining.
When she finally tore away, her lips were swollen, eyes dark.
"Do not," she said, breathing ragged, "mistake that for surrender."
"I wouldn't." He pressed the sword wanting to make the same cut but he didn't have the strength.
"Turns out I couldn't pay it back." The sword was promptly thrown away.
She stepped back, chest heaving. She wasn't scared she could swear yet she clenched her throat looking at him with an intrepid look in her eyes.
"The lesson is over we will pick up tomorrow."
She turned to leave, paused.
"And Auther?"
"Yes?"
"Use that mouth on me again without permission," she said, voice low and dangerous, "and I'll cut it off."
A beat.
Then quieter, almost a confession: "But gods help me, I felt it in my bones."
She left.
Auther watched her go, pulse thundering, body hard and aching.
He hadn't won the duel.
But he had made her burn.
Viola could not sleep.
His mouth haunted her soft, commanding, devastating. The memory of his tongue stroking hers, the way her body had melted against him despite every vow.
He was nineteen. She was old enough to know better.
And yet heat throbbed relentlessly between her thighs, slick and swollen, nipples tight and aching against her nightgown. She shifted restlessly, thighs pressing together, but the friction only sharpened the empty ache inside her.
She hated him for it.
She hated herself more for wanting more.
Finally she rose, choosing a dress that clung like a lover arms bare, scars silver in moonlight, neckline low enough to reveal the upper swell of her breasts, fabric hugging her hips.
She told herself it was only restlessness.
She lied.
The castle grounds were silent, shadows deep. She walked swiftly, pulse already racing with forbidden anticipation.
He was waiting. Looking lost as he gazed at the moon squinting as if trying to resolve something hidden in it's light.
Auther leaned against the courtyard wall, moonlight painting him in silver and shadow. His gaze raked over her slowly deliberate, possessive.
"And why might you be awake during these odd times a man's skin only gets that flawless when they sleep more than a housewife."
"I'm guarding the castle"
Viola's chin lifted. "Do not toy with me."
His smile was slow, wicked. "I am no muse unlike..." A pause then he stepped closer, glanced into the shadows. Looked a bit serious then suddenly ran tugging her along. "Run."
Confusion flickered.
"Run," he repeated, voice rougher now.
It was a game. She knew it. Yet she played along.
Yet her blood raced.
She ran.
He chased close enough that she felt his heat, heard his breath. Across moonlit stone, up hidden stairs, until he herded her into her own chamber and shut the door with a soft, final click.
Viola backed against it, chest heaving, nipples visible through thin silk. "Explain yourself."
Auther advanced, unhurried, predatory. "A test," he murmured. "And the truth."
He circled her, close enough that his fingertips brushed the air near her skin.
"You think you're in control which in most times you are but you really enjoy how your heart beats when I touch you the memory of my kiss keeps you wide awake or am I wrong?"
The room stayed silent, Auther sensed the magic had worn off the whimsy slowly breaking down, he too stopped circling her. Was it his words or something else?
"Pretentious prick!" she said holding him by his shirt the same way she held him in the arena looking into his soft emerald eyes one time before letting go
"Leave my room now!" she said anger in her voice, he knew this was coming. He could protest but he didn't want to.
"Then we will continue same time tomorrow I'll be right where you found me. Good night Commander."
"I really wish I killed you before."
He kept quiet walked out of the room and touched his neck again. He had really died today.