Misha stared at him for two seconds, not because she was considering the drink. It was mostly because she was trying to decide whether exhaustion had finally damaged her hearing.
Alaric waited with patience of a man who had apparently mistaken being rescued from an undead district for the opening act of a date. He leaned one shoulder against the wall beside the staircase.
Outside, something scraped along the street and a distant click answered it. Neither sound seemed capable of denting his confidence now that five locks, one iron door, and several layers of stone separated him from immediate death.
Misha turned away. "We should rest."
The silence behind her stretched just long enough that she almost believed she had successfully killed the conversation. Then–
"We can do that together. You and me. One bed."
Her foot stopped mid-step. Slowly, she looked over her shoulder.
Alaric smiled, not innocently. There was absolutely nothing innocent about the raised eyebrow, the lazy tilt of his shoulders, or the ease with which he leaned against the wall. The bastard looked entirely too comfortable for someone she had watched scream for his life not that long ago.
"We take turns keeping watch," Misha said flatly.
His smile deepened. "I was suggesting a different arrangement."
"I know."
That only seemed to amuse him more. His mouth pulled into a crooked grin, leaving him far too pleased with himself for a man currently standing within throwing distance.
"This place seems safe enough that the arrangement I had in mind–"
"Would you like me to throw you outside?"
Alaric paused. Then, with all the wounded dignity of a man falsely accused of some terrible crime, he murmured, "How cruel. I was only joking."
"Too bad. I didn’t get the joke." She stared at him through the blank mask.
Apparently, mortal danger had been the only thing suppressing his natural personality.
Now that the Vestiges were outside and no longer within immediate stabbing distance, Alaric had recovered every ounce of confidence he had misplaced beneath the rubble. Possibly with interest.
<The Saint Buried Upside Down> He asked her to sleep with him in under five minutes.
〔 FAVOR +200 → Gravekeeper 〕
<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> He never waits five minutes.
<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> FIVE MINUTES IS A COURTSHIP BY HIS STANDARDS
〔 FAVOR +100 → Maestro 〕
<The Last Survivor of an Unwritten World> Fascinating. His survival instincts vanish the moment the enemy stops having claws.
〔 FAVOR +50 → Gravekeeper 〕
<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> He’s only brave in romance.
〔 FAVOR +30 → Maestro 〕
Misha dismissed the window before Alaric noticed her attention drifting. "You should sleep first."
That actually caught him off guard. His brows rose. "Me?"
"You used a support skill continuously for who knows how long before I found you, and you’ve probably been running around since before sunset. Your mana can’t be unlimited."
Alaric’s smile changed, only slightly. It was less teasing and more assessing. For a moment, he looked at her as though he had not expected her to notice. The expression disappeared beneath easy charm again. "My mysterious masked savior is worried about me."
"I’m worried you’ll become useless tomorrow."
Alaric laughed softly, low and warm, and annoyingly pleasant. "I’ll respectfully decline."
"Aren’t you low on mana?"
"Painfully." He lifted one hand. "I’m painfully low on mana, mildly abused by the local dead, tragically underappreciated."
"Then why are you arguing?"
He adjusted the cuff of one black glove, then smoothed the front of his coat as though preparing himself for a ballroom rather than standing inside someone’s abandoned house during a failed city-wide evacuation.
"Because," he said, with irritating composure, "ladies first."
Misha blinked a few times, then fully turned toward him. "Excuse me?"
Alaric pushed himself away from the wall. "I may be many things, Gravekeeper."
Misha mentally began listing them. ’Coward. Flirt. Possible narcissist. Human emergency orchestra.’
He stepped closer, not enough to crowd her but just enough that she could smell whatever remained beneath the smoke and ash, a clean, faint woody scent, something warm under the metallic stink of Exodus.
Then he reached for her hand again. Misha looked down at their joined fingers.
Alaric bowed with exaggerated elegance and brought the back of her hand toward his mouth. "But I am, above all else, a gentleman."
<Observer from the Maestro’s Channel> THERE IT IS! HE SAID THE THING AGAIN!
<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> He spent the evening singing from behind a wall while a woman fought corpses for him.
<The Saint Buried Upside Down> A gentleman knows when to let a lady shine~
〔 FAVOR +250 → Gravekeeper 〕
<The Last Survivor of an Unwritten World> That is an impressive way to misspell coward
<First Mourner Beneath Creation> Courtesy born from cowardice remains courtesy.
<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> And a mushroom growing from a corpse is still a mushroom. I’m not eating it.
〔 FAVOR +50 → Gravekeeper 〕
Misha’s eyes skimmed the comments, then she looked away since a laugh had threatened to escape. She swallowed it. It was a good thing she was wearing a mask.
Alaric noticed anyway, he noticed the way her shoulders moved. "Did I make you laugh?"
Once again, she pulled her hand away from his hold. "You didn’t."
"Your mouth moved."
She paused then looked at him. "You can’t see my mouth."
Alaric stepped closer by half a pace. Before she could move, his fingers came lightly beneath the edge of her chin, not forcing, just guiding the mask upward enough that he could pretend he was examining her. "I sensed it."
Misha’s brow twitched as she met his gaze. "You sensed my mouth?"
His lips curved into a smirk this time, slow and shameless. "I’d like to, if you allowed me."
She slapped his hand away. The sound cracked sharply through the room. "Gentleman, my ass."
Alaric rubbed the back of his hand with the other one. "I’d love to feel that one too."
Misha went still as the man’s grin widened. The man had no shame. None.
"This shameless perverted–" She cut herself off before she said it aloud.
He heard it so he leaned back just enough to remain outside immediate stabbing range. He flirted like breathing came naturally, but he never trapped her against anything. Never blocked her path of escape, and never kept hold of her after she pulled away.
It was more like push, read reaction, retreat half a step. Then grin as if he had planned the entire thing. He was simply playing around.
"Fine."
Alaric’s eyebrows lifted. "Fine?" Then his gaze dipped toward her hip. "I can touch your ass?"
"No, you pervert!" The answer came so fast she almost bit her tongue.
Alaric laughed as Misha glared at him through the eyeholes of her mask.
"I’m going to sleep first."
The triumph on his face appeared immediately so Misha raised one finger. "Do not look that pleased."
"I’m pleased because you trust me."
"I don’t."
That wiped the victory away, only briefly. Then his smile returned, smaller. "Cruel twice in one evening."
"You’ll survive." Misha turned away before he could turn that into flirting too. "Also, you stay downstairs. If you need to wake me, knock."
"I know how doors work."
She placed one foot on the first stair then stopped. "Only knock."
His smile returned, slowly, and dangerously. Misha immediately regretted her phrasing.
"Only knock?" he repeated. "And under no circumstances enter? Even in an emergency?"
"If the house is actively burning, you may reconsider."
"What if I hear you scream?"
"I don’t scream."
His smirk sharpened. "That sounds like a challenge. I’d love to hear you scream my name."
Misha’s stare went dead. There was no anger or embarrassment, just flat exhaustion. She reached to her side, Twinfang came free with a whisper of steel. Then she faced him.
Alaric’s smirk faltered when he saw it.
"You. Are. Not. Allowed. Inside. The. Room." She emphasized each word as she pointed the dagger at his chest.
He raised both hands very carefully. "Of course." His mouth twitched. "An excellent practice."
"You say that while looking personally offended by it."
"I can respect a boundary and mourn it simultaneously."
Misha stared blankly at him. ’Shameless. Utterly, completely shameless.’
<The Saint Buried Upside Down> She gave him bedroom rules. This relationship is progressing beautifully.
〔 FAVOR +300 → Gravekeeper 〕
<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> You have the interpretive ability of a concussed pigeon.
<The Saint Buried Upside Down> She told him not to enter her room.
<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> Most functioning adults recognize that as the opposite of an invitation.
<The Saint Buried Upside Down> Opposites attract~
<The Last Survivor of an Unwritten World> That saying has done catastrophic damage to civilization.
<Endless Dominion> Statistically, relationship compatibility is not determined by that.
<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> Nobody invited mathematics into this disaster.
There was a pause in the chat.
Then–
<Endless Dominion> You are unusually irritable
<Prisoner of Floor One Hundred> How can I not be? I’m surrounded by idiots
Alaric extended one hand toward the staircase with exaggerated courtesy. "Your chamber awaits, my lady."
"Don’t call me that."
"My lovely Gravekeeper, then."
She sighed inwardly. "No."
"Then, Darling?"
She glared coldly at him which made the man actually flinch. It was barely but she saw it.
Then he smiled again because apparently, self-preservation only ever visited him briefly. "Sweetheart?"
She sighed through her nose. She sheathed Twinfang and turned away. Then she started climbing. "Good night, Alaric."
He perked up immediately. "Ah. We’ve reached first-name privileges already."
Misha stopped halfway in the middle and she slowly looked back. She reconsidered leaving him alive downstairs.
Alaric leaned against the banister, one arm draped lazily across the wood. His grin made it painfully obvious that he knew exactly what he was doing. Then he laughed, genuine enough to sound different from the teasing noises he had made earlier. "Go to sleep, sweetheart. I’ll keep watch."
She was too exhausted to even retort. "You wake me in two hours. If I wake up and you’re standing inside the room, I’m stabbing you."
"Where?"
She stared blankly at him and his smile became even more unbearable.
"You threaten men beautifully, darling." He tilted his head. "But you really don’t have to worry about me."
"That sentence has never made anyone worry less." With that, she left him there.
By the time she reached the top, he called again. "And for the record–"
Misha stopped but refused to turn around this time.
"I really am a gentleman."
Sighing once more, she looked over her shoulder. He stood beneath the dim light with one hand resting on the rail, looking too confident and entirely too composed.
"I’ll determine that after I wake up with all my organs."
Despite everything, the screaming, the shameless flirting, he had maintained his support while frightened enough to lose control of his lyrics earlier. He had healed a stranger without knowing who she was. And when given the choice between resting and letting her sleep first, he had refused without hesitation. Cowardly did not necessarily mean unreliable.
Still, Misha did not trust him. Not yet. It was much too early to trust him. People could be heroes for a minute and monsters for years.
Trust was not built because a handsome man healed a few cuts, and knew how to turn fear into music. Even with him downstairs keeping watch after refusing to sleep first, Misha refused to let herself feel reassured. Hope always started that way, small, harmless, and easy to believe in. She hated those flickers most. They slipped in gently, only to hurt more when they were taken away.
Misha closed the bedroom door and locked it. Then she checked the lock twice. Only after that did she let her back settle against the wood.
Later, she could decide what to do with Alaric Valehart. Tonight, she needed rest. If the shameless bastard opened that bedroom door without permission, her daggers would decide the rest.
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