She took a shaky breath and looked around in panic. "You're mad to be here. Why did you come?"
I was drawn to you. I thought about you over and over again for the last two years. I needed to see you again.
"I told you, I came to thank you," Akiva said instead.
She was skeptical, and her eyes widened even more than before. "Assassination? You'll never get close to the Warlord."
"No. I wouldn't tarnish the gift you gave me with the blood of your folk," he said solemnly.
He looked around at the agora. Children's laughter and smiling couples surrounded him. Tables of the food he smelt earlier and beverages of bright colours were placed on grand tables placed at the outer corners. Gecko-crabs scuttled and beetle-rats scampered across the ground, scavenging for food.
"Gift?" she said incredulously. "You hold that gift lightly, coming here, into certain death!"
"I'm not going to die. Not tonight," he said. "A thousand things might have stopped me from being here right now, but instead, a thousand things brought me here. Everything lined up. It has been easy, as if it were meant-"
"Meant!" she said, amazed. She huffed. "As if what were meant?"
Akiva's blazing eyes lit up even more, with amusement. "You. And me."
Her neck flushed and let out an uneven breath. She took a few moments to think.
"You're mad," was all she said.
"It's your madness too. You saved my life. Why did you do it?"
It was a fair question. Her brow furrowed in thought. Why did she save the angel?
Before she could answer, he continued. "And tonight. A million souls in the city, I might not have found you at all. I might have searched all night and never so much as glimpsed at you, but instead, there you were, like you were set down in front of me, and you were all alone, moving through the crowd and apart in it, like you were waiting for me. Don't you think that's more than a coincidence? And when you saved my life, no one else saw you help me, and I haven't been caught tonight. One angel amongst millions of chimaera. Meant to be."
The girl wasn't listening anymore. She looked worried. And terrified.
"You don't understand," she said as she turned around to scan the crowd. "There was a reason no one was dancing with me. I thought you were brave. I didn't know you were mad-"
Akiva was confused. "What reason?"
She looked back at him with urgency in her eyes. "Trust me. It isn't safe for you here. If you want to live, leave me."
What? He hadn't come all this way just to leave. "I've come a long way to find you-"
"I'm spoken for," she blurted, wincing at her own words.
He frowned. "Spoken for? Betrothed?"
"As good as," she said. "Now go. If Thiago sees you-"
"Thiago?" Akiva recoiled with disgust. "You're betrothed to the Wolf?"
As soon as he'd said the words, a jackal-headed creature aspect with bat wings and caracal haunches came up behind the girl and put her arms around her waist.
The girl's large brown eyes went wide and the blood drained from her lips. She'd thought it was Thiago. The creature behind her giggled, and the girl almost slumped with obvious relief.
"There you are. We lost you in the crush!" the creature aspect said. Akiva could see a lizard aspect right behind her.
Then she peered at Akiva with curiosity. "Hello."
The girl whipped around without a second glance at Akiva. "Some friends you are," she chided. "To dress me like this and then abandon me to the Serpentine. I might have been mauled."
"We thought you were behind us," the lizard aspect said defensively.
"I was," she responded. "Far behind you."
She started to herd her friends away, as if trying to say, Leave. Now.
He watched her exit. He wouldn't just leave. Not without learning her name, at least.
So instead, he moved to the side, and waited for his chance.