Nikias said, “We can’t afford to wait for Hypatia and Konstantin to arrive. We’ll have to take the mage with us to your estate.”
Aimilia nodded. “Yes, but then we still have the problem of no one in our entourage knowing his language and I highly doubt anyone at the estate will know it either, so we won’t be able to interrogate him until Hypatia and Konstantin arrive. All we can do is keep him alive. Unless you want to have some of our guards take him back to Desero.”
“No. With how many got away, I’m not risking them managing to rescue him or coming after us again if we’re split. We need our guards with us. We’ll keep him until they’re able to catch up.”
They fell into silence for a moment. But now that she had him awake and cognizant, she had to say… “Thank you.”
Nikias blinked at her for a moment and then stumbled over, “What for?”
“You saved my life. Several times, actually.” Aimilia smiled and held up her hand, twisting the ring on it. “I’m not always completely ungrateful to you.”
Nikias said, “I never said you were.”
Aimilia raised an eyebrow.
Nikias amended, “Recently, I mean.”
“Still, if it hadn’t been for you, I don’t expect I would have survived.”
Nikias shook his head. “No thanks is necessary. I know you’re a capable commander. But I could not help myself. I could not bear even the thought of anything happening to you, so I couldn’t let anything happen to you. That’s all it was. Losing you…”
Now Aimilia was even more confused.
Weren’t these the things he’d been saying to her when he thought she was Faustina?
He couldn’t truly be echoing the same sentiments to Aimilia. The words fell out before she could stop them.
“Nikias, I’m not yours to lose.”
Nikias closed his eyes, his brow furrowing. “I know. Believe me, I know.”
Aimilia winced. That had come out more cruelly than she’d meant it to. She’d meant quite a few of the cruel things she’d said to him over the years, but that one she hadn’t. Maybe he’d deserved some of them in the past, but that hadn’t made them any less cruel.
“Maybe you can help me understand something. Why would you even want me to be yours to lose? All those little logical reasons you gave me when you proposed, they don’t account for this. Not even your ego is big enough to account for all of this.”
Nikias shifted, brushing his hand across his chest briefly. “I want to ask you if you remember, but I know you do. I don’t think either of us could ever forget that morning when Gavril issued a challenge to me for what I’d done to Marcella.”
Aimilia’s breath caught in her throat. “And? I already told you I was trying to save Gavril.”
Nikias nodded. “I know that now, but at the time… Let me say this. You knew that when I accepted that challenge, I wasn’t going to fight back. After you came and told me that Gavril was going to run away, I knew what needed to be done. In order to keep Gavril in Areator, I would have to stop him from leaving, and in order to stop him from leaving, I would have to pay with my life for what I’d done.”
Aimilia hadn’t realized that. She’d gone and yelled at Nikias, revealing Gavril’s plan in a desperate attempt to keep him in Areator so as not to lose him, even as her friend, if she could not have him as a husband.
“I went into that challenge ready to die.”
Aimilia had suspected so, but she held her breath anyway, hearing him admit it.
“And it’s with great shame I admit there was part of me that wanted to. I had little interest in living now that I had knew how hollow I still was after getting the revenge I’d been trying to chase, or even just the facsimile of it.”
Aimilia started to reach out, but then quickly pulled her hand back. Nikias’ eyes snapped down toward the motion.
He then reached out and took her hand, running his thumb over her palm. He said, “When Marcella came out and begged Gavril to spare me, I couldn’t comprehend it. That wasn’t what I’d wanted. That wasn’t what I had accepted would be my fate. But then I saw you and I put it together. It had been your doing. I know now the truth of your motive, but at the time, I thought it was because you cared about my life. In spite of everything I’ddone, I’d believed you wanted me to live. That was enough to make me want to live again.”
Aimilia stared at him. “And everything that came after?”
Nikias said, “I did all of it because I thought you had given me a second chance at life, so I was going to start fixing the mess I’d made. Of course, change doesn’t happen overnight. And I still wasn’t completely impartial when it came to anything regarding the Desero demon. So I will admit, I did not make the wisest of decisions. But it wasn’t some elaborate trick. It wasn’t a scheme. I meant it. You made me want to live again. Aimilia, you’re the only reason I’m alive right now.”
Now things were starting to make a little more sense. But…
