Liliana picked nervously at the edge of Emyr’s sleeve. He hadn’t spoken for over five minutes now, and she knew if she looked up, his face would be a stoney mask, his whirling thoughts locked carefully away.

Over the course of her story, they had shifted. Her legs were thrown over his thighs, her head fit firmly under his chin, and his arms were wrapped around her. Protectively, she thought. He’d gripped her rather tightly when he realized, through seeing her own memories of it, that she had a far closer and more intimate relationship with death than anyone else they knew.

After all, no one else they knew had actually died and seen what came after.

She’d tried to pull away, when she revealed, with stuttering words barely more than whispers, body shaking like she’d been electrocuted, that the girl Emyr had known for the past almost six years was not the same Liliana who had been born in this body. That’s when Liliana ended up half in his lap. He’d refused to let her go, tugging her as close as he could and silently encouraging her to continue her tale.

It should’ve been suffocating. Restrictive. Being wrapped up like a constrictor coiling around its prey. But it wasn’t. It felt safe.

Now she was done speaking for long enough that the room had devolved into a tense silence. Nothing but her uneven breaths, just this side of panicked, filling the air and the sound of blood pumping in her ears.

Does he regret his oath now? Does he hate me? Hate himself for tying himself to someone who has lied to him the entire time he knew me? He can’t tell anyone, can’t turn on me because of the oath. Does he resent it now? Liliana wondered, feeling panic and fear coursing through her, turning her muscles to rigid stone as she stiffened in her spot.

Liliana thought, believed if perhaps with a touch too much foolish, naïve hope, that she could survive many of the people she loved turning from her. It would hurt her, wound her, and would undoubtedly change her. But she doubted many could break her.

Emyr though, there was no doubt, no wonder or theorizing of a possible survival in the wake of him leaving her behind.

He had been her very first friend in this world, the first person her own age she had allowed herself to trust without the security of a bond tying them together. The first person she’d thrown herself in harm’s way to save. Emyr was… so much to her, she couldn’t even find the words to fully describe it. Best friend. Brother. Secret keeper. Partner. As much a part of her as any of her bonds, as her own heart and lungs.

She’d die for him without a moment’s hesitation.

If Emyr turned from her… Liliana knew she wouldn’t survive it. Whatever was left when he took her heart with him, it wouldn’t be someone she would even recognize. Empty. A shell.

“Stop spiraling, I’m processing,” Emyr chided, one of his hands, not the one Liliana was picking at incessantly from her nerves, rubbed up her upper arm comfortingly. Once more she had to wonder if Emyr had some kind of emotion sensing skill, or a mind reading one. Or perhaps, simpler than that, he just knew her too well.

“I wasn’t spiraling,” Liliana hissed, her voice too full of relief to be properly insulted.

Emyr chuckled lowly, the sound rolling through her from where she was pressed so firmly against him and doing as much as his touch to calm her ever dismal thoughts. Liliana moved her ministrations to his finger, the one that held the Rosengarde rose on it now, a permanent mark of the choice he’d made.

A choice he’d made for her, because he understood her in a way no one else ever had. Because he knew how deeply her ingrained distrust ran, now matter how fiercely she loved. Trust had never been a requirement for her to love, and sometimes she wondered how different she’d be if that were not true.

“I don’t regret it,” Emyr answered her unsaid thoughts, turning his hand to tangle their fingers together and squeezed tightly.

Liliana squeezed back, marveling not for the first time at the easy physical affection she traded with her closest friends. She had watched them with others, even in their own group, and saw they did not often engage in such things with each other. But those closest to her seemed to sense, or understand, some signal she unconsciously gave off, that she craved such things. Needed the warmth and comfort of physical connection.

The only exception she had seen was Anya, who was physically affectionate with everyone. Liliana thought it was a result of how she was raised in a large, very physical family. Anya had told her how all the children of her family would sleep together in a large pile more often than not, much like the wolf cubs they resembled, in ways often times deeper than their simple outwards appearance.

Marianne, however, was usually only physically affectionate with Liliana, or Anya, or whichever unlucky student had fallen prey to her flirtations that particular day. Alistair was similar. He only traded physical affection with Liliana or Emyr. And for the longest time, until the two boys had finally acknowledged what everyone else had seen, it had only been Liliana that Alistair was comfortable trading easy affection with.

“Even after…?” Liliana trailed off, too unused to speaking so openly, to speaking at all of the greatest secret she’d kept from everyone for so long.

It still felt surreal that she had opened the Pandora’s box she’d kept so tightly locked inside of her for so long. She was almost convinced she’d wake any moment and realize this had all been a dream. But even her imagination could’ve never come up with this.

“Yes, even after realizing you came from a different world full of fantastical things, saw me through some magical seer device, died, talked to Vita and came to this world,” Emyr elucidated, carefully avoiding mentioning the fact that Liliana had stolen her current body. Not willingly, not through any choice, but it didn’t change the old guilt she still harbored over it.

“It’s called a video game. I told you that,” Liliana huffed slightly. She wasn’t upset. Her relief that was making her limbs feel fuzzy and her mind almost blank with the force of it was too all-encompassing for anything else to slip in.

She hadn’t expected him to truly understand many of the things from her world. Too much of the technology was so far advanced it would be indistinguishable from feats of incredible magic to Emyr. Some things were similar, such as plumbing, lighting and general cooling and heating. But trying to get someone from this world to understand something like the Internet would take far more than a single evening.

There were other things… weapons Liliana could remember the damage of, but not anything about. She knew those were memories taken by Vita in the process of her reincarnation. Liliana wasn’t too upset by that. This world was capable of doing enough damage with magic. She didn’t want to know what they could do when combined with the weapons that had death tolls in the hundreds of thousands as well.

“One of those words makes little sense to me, and I don’t see how a scrying illusion capable of seeing the future that gave you details of my life could be considered a game,” Emyr retorted, a bit of irritation leaking into his voice.

And. Well, that was fair, if Liliana was honest. She couldn’t imagine she’d enjoy finding out someone had been playing her life in some game and using it as a source of entertainment when it was filled with so much pain and strife for her.

“I didn’t know you were real,” Liliana said softly, squeezing his fingers again, “but I’m so glad you are,” she added, voice low but full of love.

“Are you… upset? That I… stole this body?” Liliana asked, voice small and filled with a fear she couldn’t hide. Emyr squeezed her tightly against him in response.

“Based on what you told and showed me, I don’t see how it was your choice,” Emyr started and Liliana felt some of the guilt that always weighed her down like a ball and chain lift slightly.

“And bad as it sounds, I’m glad you did,” Emyr continued, and Liliana pulled back enough to look up at him, eyes wide in shock. Emyr stared back at her, face set in mulish determination.

“You’re glad that she-she died?” Liliana asked, aghast.

“Yes, I am. Because I didn’t love her, I love you and if you had never taken her body, I would have never met you. From the paraphrased explanation you gave me, she would’ve in fact become my enemy. So yes, I’m quite glad she is dead and not here trying to kill me, and that you’re here instead. And if I had a choice, I’d sacrifice her again for you,” Emyr stated without hesitation, his blunt honesty striking Liliana mute and dumbfounded as she stared at Emyr.

She’d considered how this conversation could go a million times. Run through different possibilities and reactions in her mind time and again, had decided based on what she’d imagined that the risks were far too high to ever reveal the truth to anyone.

But she’d never imagined someone would tell her they were glad that the original Liliana was dead. She’d imagined them forgiving her, yes, for her crime. Coming to accept it. But not to be glad. To say they’d repeat the event if given a chance to sacrifice another’s life and soul for her.

Perhaps… Liliana had been underestimating her friends. She knew, without hesitation, that she’d make the same choice for them. She’d sacrifice anyone, innocent or guilty, for those she loved. She’d raze cities if needed for them. She knew her own loyalty and love, and knew the lengths she’d go for those she cared for. But… she had never considered that perhaps the sentiments weren’t entirely one sided in nature.

Then again, if anyone was going to murder someone for her sake, her first bet would always be Emyr. He had few morals as it was, though he hid it beneath a veneer of propriety. When it came to those he cared for, Emyr saw no length too far, no cost too great. In that, they were the same.

“Lili,” Emyr said slowly, face softening when he saw her obvious confusion, “is it that hard to accept that you’re loved? Not because of anything the girl who had this body before you did, but because of you? Because of all you’ve done?” Emyr asked gently, reaching up a hand to rub away a tear Liliana hadn’t even realized she’d shed.

“I-I don’t,” Liliana stammered, struggling to get her mind to comprehend this. To handle what Emyr was saying, words she’d never even considered, along with the fact that her mind was restructuring the preconceived notions she’d been basing so much of her behavior around.

“Lili, it was you who tackled a giant tiger when we were only fourteen to keep me safe. It was you who nearly died taking a dagger for me not much later. It was you who let a serpent impale you with fangs so you could save my life. And it was you, a hundred times more, who never hesitated to step in front of me to take damage in my place.” Emyr gripped her face with strong but careful hands as he held her gaze, impressing upon her the veracity of his words. Forcing her to see, to understand where Emyr’s loyalty, his love, was coming from.

It came from a fourteen-year-old boy, who had followed a fourteen-year-old girl on a reckless quest, knowing she disliked him. Who had watched the same girl who disdained his very presence fling herself at a tiger who could kill her with a blow. It came from a boy who had seen a girl, full of a desperation for power and mistrust, risk her life for him, time and again, without hesitation.

It came from a boy who had seen a girl, so full of hurt, anger and paranoia, slowly allow him into her very rare trust. From a thousand gifted secrets, great and small, each a precious gift she’d never given to another.

“So, is it that odd that I don’t really care about the girl who I never really knew? Who never did anything for me? I regret not giving her the apology she deserved, but I will never regret that you’re in my life,” Emyr finished, leaning forward to press a kiss to Liliana’s forehead. Liliana let him pull her back against his chest as she forced herself to take a deep breath and came to terms with this new information.

“Is that why you didn’t trust me at first? Because of the game?” Emyr’s sneer was audible in the last word several minutes later, when Liliana had time to process this new revelation.

“That and the memories, but the game was a big part, yes. You killed me in that game!” Liliana defended her reasoning, flushing at the admittedly perhaps rash and foolish reasoning she’d used.

She’d been young though, in a new world and surrounded by people she’d thought, with good reason, were enemies. She deserved some clemency for her choices, foolish and illogical as some of them were in the hindsight age and wisdom now gave her.

If she had the option, she’d make different choices. Who wouldn’t, when considering the choices they’d made as children? But she knew she’d had reasonings that she’d found entirely logical at the time.

“I didn’t kill you. A possible future version of me killed the previous soul who happened to share a face and body with you. But you’re two very different people,” Emyr clarified and Liliana’s mouth shut with a click as that registered.

Two different people. It was such a simple thing.

Liliana had come to accept that she’d changed this world to some degree with her simply being in it. Changes were inevitable when new variables were introduced to an environment. But some part of her had never fully accepted that the Liliana from the game and the Liliana she was now were two vastly different people, if only by virtue of their wildly different experiences.

Liliana wondered, had she told Emyr this sooner, had he said those words to her sooner, how different would things have been? What choices would’ve changed? If she’d had someone tell her, bluntly, that she was a different person to the villain she’d seen in the game, how would that have altered her?

There was no way to know, not for sure. All she could know was that as the words settled in her mind, digging in deep like a burr, that they would change her in some way she couldn’t anticipate just yet.

“Would you still… if I was like her?” Liliana asked, half curious, half afraid. Because she knew she was dark at times. Her moral compass had been distorted so far by this world she wasn’t sure she even had a true north anymore.

“If you became some kind of dark overlord?” Emyr asked, and Liliana nodded.

“Then I guess I better brush up on my evil monologues and maniacal laughter,” Emyr said without hesitation, startling a laugh from Liliana.

“No, please don’t. You already terrify the younger years,” Liliana admonished as she giggled. The laughter felt good. It loosened the last of the fear and anxiety from inside of her.

“What a waste. I’d be a very good minion,” Emyr sighed gustily, as if this was some great tragedy, to veer away from becoming an evil villain.

Liliana thought perhaps Cista should award her some medal of valor for this. She wasn’t sure the country would survive Emyr if he truly wanted to become evil. But for all he’d made a joke, Liliana was sure if she truly decided to do just that, he would join her.

It settled something inside of her. This… trust she hadn’t had before that, no matter what, Emyr would stand by her. She somehow knew now that there was nothing Liliana could do that would turn him away from her.

Liliana didn’t realize how secure it made her feel, to know without a shred of doubt, that even if the entire world turned on her, she’d still have at least this one person who would stand with her. It was more than the oath, because Liliana had a feeling Emyr would’ve done all of this without it. He had said as much. It wasn’t he who needed the oath, but her.

“You’ll be the first to know if I decide I need a minion for world domination,” Liliana teased, and Emyr chuckled.

“Good. I wouldn’t want to miss it,” Emyr told her, pressing a kiss to the top of her hair as Liliana let out a breath in contentment.

“Would you… want to share more of your world with me?” Emyr asked softly and Liliana felt a thrill of happiness at the thought of sharing a world that had once been her home with someone so very dear to her.

Her bonds knew, though generally only Polaris cared about it. To share it with another person though, a friend, to no longer be the only human on this world who knew of Earth, it lifted a loneliness Liliana had hardly realized she’d been dealing with.

“I’d love that,” Liliana said, smiling so widely her cheeks hurt from it as she tightened her hold on his hand.

She appreciated that Emyr was directing the conversation to lighter topics, sensing in his uncanny way that now was not the time to dive into the deeper ones. To discuss Vita, or the quest she’d been set on. Liliana didn’t think she could handle it, as emotionally drained as she was already.

Emyr also had not brought up revealing this secret to anyone else, not even Alistair. His reasons for not doing it were unknown, but Liliana appreciated it nonetheless. It was unlikely he would ever press her, though. He never had when it came to sharing her secrets. He only pressed when Liliana kept secrets from him. He didn’t usually seem to care what she kept from others.

A yawn surprised Liliana until she checked the time and realized it was far later than she normally stayed up. Her body was exhausted from a day of flying, and her mind was dulling with tiredness.

“We’ll hold off on the stories until tomorrow. You need to sleep,” Emyr said upon noticing her yawn.

“Stay?” Liliana asked sleepily, the yawn seeming to be her body’s signal to turn towards sleep as she blinked heavy eyes.

Emyr gave a noise of assent and Liliana reached out a tendril of Mana to dim the lights in her room as they shifted from sitting to lying down. Sleeping together wasn’t an unusual thing for Liliana and her friends. Liliana truly thought Vereign had just utterly given up on their entire group when it came to such things. It helped that he knew none of them were doing anything untoward.

Well. If you ignored Marianne, they weren’t doing anything untoward.

She probably owed their homeroom Professor a fruit basket, thinking on that. The poor man, they had terrorized him for three and a half years.

“Night, Lili. Love you,” Emyr murmured.

“Night Em, love you too, even if you want to be an evil minion,” Liliana responded with a smile as she felt herself drift off to the sound of his low chuckles.