Felix POV:
Her pillowy lips parted in a pant, sweat slicking back her hair and running through her cleavage, "Felix.."
I closed my eyes for a moment, swallowing back the thoughts running rampant in my brain, "you sound..." breathless, needy, innocently seductive? "...restless Winter, whats wrong."
She stabbed her sword into the earth with more force than the Winter from two months prior would even dream of, "It has been months since I obtained my sword and I am still so useless."
I watched her stretch, back arching.
It had taken a while to convince her that wearing trousers are okay for her to wear as as she trained but it still irked me that Medicus and Stulta had convinced her to do so.
Sure it was more practical for Winter, but also wildly inappropriate for a woman of her standing.
She's young, naive, hasn't noticed that the rest of us literally avoid looking at her when she is dressed in such a way because there is so much to look at.
I often find myself failing in avoiding looking at the normally reserved girl. "You are progressing well Winter."
And it was true, her progress shows physically.
While always beautiful she was a princess, before she started rigorous training she was soft in several place where now fine lines of muscle peeked through.
The girl I was just beginning to know once more was changing before my eyes. It was bittersweet.
The last time I saw Winter she was 12, when I saw her again two months ago three years had passed.
She changed so much in that time, at least in a physical sense.
Nothing felt the same and yet, it was exactly that.
As if sensing my thoughts she smiled over at me, "you are being too kind Felix, you always were."
"No." I started, "you truly are improving, swordsmanship takes time Winter."
She stared down at her sword, "we don't have time Felix, its hardly been two months and my mother...." she trailed off voice breaking.
Her mother was laying siege to every town Winter may have been spotted in. People are starving, taxes have risen Ariaá is slowly falling apart.
Everything wrong with this kingdom that Winter wishes to fix is growing worse.
"We are improving Winter. While conditions may be worsening we are growing stronger."
She sighed, approaching and wrapping her arms around me as she did when we were children and she was upset, "You are a true miracle Felix. We would be nothing without you."
"No, we would be nothing without you Winter White."
She gave a short, sad, laugh, "I am nothing but a symbol in this. You are the true leader."
I wanted to argue.
Tell her that without her I would not be here to command these people. That they only listen to me because of her faith in me.
But she felt as though she had something to prove. "We can agree to disagree Winter, if you want to grow stronger you must practice."
Her arms squeezed me tighter, "just one more moment of this?"
"I..."
"You must be tired from training too," she murmured, "your heart is racing Felix."
I pulled the girl closer, not willing to admit that it had been a long moment since I stopped in my training to watch her. "I suppose.."
She hummed a bit as I looked over her head, eyes meeting Malevolum as he leaned against a tree at the edge of the woods.
His steely gaze took us in as he shook his head.
I nodded back to him.
I know. I thought, better than anyone, I know my place.
And it certainly isn't in the arms of a princess.
~~
I woke with a groan, that same ache in my chest as always when it came to my strange dreams of Winter, "fucking hell..."
"Problem?" Malevolum asked from his seat by the hotel window.
I groaned, rubbing my eyes, "what time is it?"
"5am." He responded gruffly, "Verecundus isn't awake yet."
"Remind me again why we are stalking him?" I grumbled.
"Because the first day here Stulta scared the ever loving shit out of him and now he wont even answer the door."
True.
The idiotic girl just marched up to his door, knocked on it and started talking about Winter. Leaving us in this mess.
"You never said what was wrong. You look sick to your stomach." He sneered, "and I don't want to catch it."
I debated telling him about my dreams before sighing, "Bad dream."
"Involving Winter?"
I stared at him.
"You said her name." His gaze narrowed on me, "like you used to. Something I noticed was lacking while you were with her."
"What is that supposed to mean?" I snapped.
"Was this dream in a forest or a palace."
My brows furrowed, how did he... "how.."
"Forest. Or. Palace."
"Forest." I mumbled.
He sighed, "of course it was, thats when it got worse."
"What did."
Malevolum looked back out the window but seemed lost in a memory, "she wasn't a little girl anymore. It surprised all of us who had been gone too long...but it hit you the hardest Felix. I had thought when we left, your feelings were already gone you being 17 and her not having even hit adulthood yet. And I am sure it did for a while..." he sighed, "but then you found her again. She was still young but there was no mistaking her for a child anymore."
I wanted to ask him how he knew any of this but there was something in his tone that told me interrupting would only silence him.
"It was horrible and painful to watch. Your love for Winter."
My what?
He looked me over, shaking his head, "I warned you against training her, offered to myself. But you were determined, claimed it was no issue at all. Once you even lied to my face and told me you felt nothing toward her. But of course it was always in the way you said her name."
"And how is that?" I asked.
"You always called her like some would call god. With a reverence and worship, but with so much longing it almost hurt to hear. What did you dream Felix?"
"Training." I started, "before that getting a sword, and before that finding her."
"And when you wake, how do you feel?"
I said nothing.
"That bad then." He sighed heavily, "the one good thing the Grimhilde ever did for you and its the first your reclaiming."
"What?"
"When this happened to us all, your longing for the girl you could never have seemed to have left you, and yet no memory of us all. Its the first thing your mind is reclaiming."
"You act as if it all happened."
His look was grave, "Felix. In those dreams of yours, you will always be left longing. There is never anything more."
"How would you know th-"
"Because I was there." He cut in, "and you were smart enough to realize nothing could ever come from it. You have never even tasted her lips Felix, and you never will. Brace yourself for the dreams to come, I can only imagine how much it will hurt reclaiming them."
