Oktofinitum

Chapter 44

Rexel

"Are you really sure about this plan?" Pepper only looked at me and blinked as if my asking her about her visions was utterly insulting. She was drying her hair and preparing to take respite for the night and I was reminded of our earlier escapade at the residential district where we were assigned to investigate.

There was nothing much we found really because most of the people living there are usually noble families whose houses are far apart from each other with gated manors and such. It was a quiet stroll over the brick walkway of the mainroad, stretching a few miles, with the view of the river, the market, and the palace, over the horizon. I still haven't gotten over the way she dismissed our kiss as nothing. I wanted to scream in frustration at how easily she could dismiss my feelings like that, "Am I really nothing to you?" She stopped in her tracks and gazed at me for a short moment but then resumed inspecting the surroundings, "This is hardly the time nor place to talk about personal matters."

"And when is the right time, really? Last night at the boat? After we get back to the academy? Is there any right time for you to finally admit that you have feelings for me too, you're suppressing for some reason I can't fathom," I can't help but blurt out.

"Why? What's about that kiss you can't get over? It's not like you haven't kissed anyone else before? I distinctly remember you kissing Glenn during your older brother's wedding, right?" I opened my mouth to say something, maybe defend myself for that memory she was pertaining to –that I didn't want that kiss to happen, it was Glenn who kissed me and I was only caught off guard, "And besides, it wasn't even you that I kissed. It was an incubus pretending to be yo–" She was about to say more when she suddenly stopped as if in a trance, it was a familiar look on her eyes. A hollow and empty gaze as if it was looking not at me but at something beyond me, "Pepper? Are you having a vision?" I received no response from her and she only stood there as if a statue when a fast riding carriage suddenly came at us. I held her at the small of her back to avoid the carriage but I wasn't able to calculate her dead-like weight so we both fell underwater.

The depth of the river beside the brickroad surprised me, but thankfully I was able to inhale a huge breath before actually sinking, Pepper on the other hand was still in a trance. I saw her eyes unwavering, her mouth forming bubbles and her body sinking like a corpse unable to move. I immediately swam towards her and grabbed her by the waist but she wasn't conscious still. This is the weakness of her visions, whenever she gets in a trance, her physical body becomes vulnerable.

I contemplated for a moment but I knew what I had to do to save her from drowning. I planted my lips onto her and breathed for her.

I was taken aback when she shook her hair towel in the air, "Will I ever get a proper answer from you?" She looked at me again, this time her gaze softened, she knew what question I was pertaining to and it was no longer about the vision she saw at the river while drowning nor about the plan she had for this mission. But instead of answering, she only looked at me with those hazel brown eyes, that look that reaches to the soul, as if she knew something I didn't. She's always been like that, maybe because of her ability as a seer to look not just at the facade of the person presently in front of her, but way beyond –look at one's past or even future. It pains me to know that she's seen a vision of a future where she and I could never be, is that why she doesn't want to give me a chance? Or maybe she just doesn't like me –a nagging voice said in my head.

"If they really lead us to their lair tomorrow, she and I will have to infiltrate them to get information. She's just a novice," I tried to explain which made her raise a brow, "Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against her rank, it's just she probably has no experience in that regard and she may be a liability," but she only left out a soft sigh.