Long ago, whenever Rose had whined that she was bored, Brad would always chuckle affectionately and tell her that boredom was a luxury. Not until just now had she realized what exactly he meant.

It had been awhile since the world had allowed her to awaken gradually; as wakefulness washed over her in gentle waves, Rose found herself actually smiling in anticipation of the day to come—full of promise instead of events. There were still plans to be made, of course, and they'd have to clear out by nightfall; but overall, today felt almost like a vacation in comparison to what Rose had been dealing with lately. Lunarre was dead; her family was safe; and all was right with the world… except for this perpetual storm.

And even that didn't seem so bad, as Rose eased herself into consciousness; this was actually a nice change of pace, lying here lazily and listening to Dezel's slow and steady heartbeat beneath her ear, the sound intermingling with that of the rain on the roof above her—until… "Sleep well?" mumbled Dezel sardonically, evidently sensing her wakefulness, and stirred beneath her.

Rose reluctantly opened her eyes, having been savoring the sensation of half-consciousness, and gave a small sigh into his bare skin. As he shivered instinctively, she couldn't help but laugh lightly at the reflexive motion, but that only made things worse; this time, he seized up and pushed her off altogether.

Sprawling on the floor, Rose glanced around at the beds to find them still full; the Scattered Bones yet slumbered, so she'd better be quiet. "Yeah, I slept fine," she yawned, sitting up to stretch her aching muscles. "What about—you?" she managed, falling back to lean on her hands.

"On this floor, with someone like you holding me down all night?" he snorted, hugging his arms around his midriff as though cold; Rose momentarily entertained the thought of yanking a blanket off the nearest bed and throwing it over him, but decided against it: she didn't want to wake anyone, after all. "Hardly."

A smile tugged at Rose's mouth as a terrible joke flitted across her newly wakeful mind; Lailah would be proud. "Oh, I get it," she giggled, rapping her knuckles on the floorboards pointedly (albeit as quietly as possible). "Because the ground is hard?"

Dezel rolled his blind eyes, hiding his face in his hand. "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that," he muttered, shaking his head in exasperation—resentment veiling amusement in his tone. "Anyway, I'm going back to sleep," he continued, yawning widely. "Stay away from me unless your life is in danger, or I'll endanger it for you."

Though grudging affection edged his admonition, Rose's confidence faltered abruptly, and she bit her lip as she realized that she hadn't had an openly kind word from him all morning. In the aftermath of Dezel's recovery, she'd forgotten that he didn't typically like being smothered in attention—and given everything he'd done for her, from postponing his mission to sheltering her from Lunarre, he probably thought Rose's behavior was obnoxious to the point of unforgivable.

Really, Dezel would be well justified in disliking her; how long had he lain there that morning, waiting for her to wake up so he could convince her to move? After all, he'd only agreed to let her sleep on top of him in the first place if she found him a shirt; Rose had thought she'd stopped acting so entitled after she learned about everything he'd done for her, but apparently she had a ways to go.

Wait a minute; since when had she cared? This wasn't like her; Dezel was supposed to be the brooding one. Maybe vessels came to resemble their seraphim, or something, because there was no other possible explanation for why Rose had suddenly allowed all her lingering doubts to overwhelm her like this.

Regardless of the reason behind this shift, Rose had to clear the air before Dezel escaped back into slumber. "I don't think you've ever threatened me before," she remarked hesitantly, crawling cautiously to his side—staying a respectful distance away out of newfound concern for his comfort. "Did I do something wrong?" she added, trying to keep her tone light; but she couldn't conceal a note of lingering anxiety.

Dezel let out a long sigh. "Don't worry," he told her dryly, opening one blind eye to gaze at her with guarded expression… though Rose couldn't help noting a peculiar interest in his features. "I haven't changed. You're the one who's suddenly gotten insecure—and this is no time to turn shy." He closed his eyes, the barest hint of a smile tugging at his mouth. "At least your terrible timing is still the same."

Rose rolled her eyes. If anything had stayed the same, it was that he still didn't know how to stop being sarcastic long enough to have a serious discussion with her. "Sorry if I'm trying to avoid annoying you," she hissed, cracking her knuckles out of sheer frustration. "It won't happen again. I'll just keep doing my own thing from now on, and if you don't like it, tough."

"Good," returned Dezel, evidently satisfied, and Rose frowned as he closed his eyes without another word. Of all the things she could have said to appease him, that had been about the last one she'd thought would do the trick.

She shook her head, scowling. "Let me know when it's safe to come near you again," she muttered crossly. Today had started off so well, too; but with this many conflicting (not to mention confusing) emotions bubbling in her soul, she supposed it had been unrealistic to assume the dominant one would always be positive. Or that all her interactions with Dezel would be as full of playful banter as last night.

Shaking her head to stir herself from her restless thoughts, Rose let out a long sigh and lay back to stare at the ceiling. She had a lot of strategizing to do, and if Dezel felt like staying out of the way, so much the better.


…Except, apparently, that staying out of the way was code for possessing her consciousness even while unconscious. Try as she might, Rose couldn't concentrate on their next step; Dezel kept hijacking her train of thought, and it was all she could do to wrest control from his half-gloved grasp.

She might have understood if her mind had snagged on their exchange after she'd first awakened, but no; that would make too much sense. Instead, her thoughts tended towards Dezel in his entirety, standing solidly in the middle of her inexplicable maelstrom of emotions. As her mind continually refused to move beyond his presence both in her mind and outside of it, Rose found herself glancing over at him more and more often… until finally her eyes came to rest on his face one last time, and there they stayed.

It was so easy to forget that Dezel wasn't human, she reflected, narrowing her eyes contemplatively; had not his lips parted slightly to reveal the tips of his jagged teeth, she might have thought him a mortal like herself. His chest may rise and fall in the deep breaths of slumber, just like the rest of her family; but they'd all breathe their last so much sooner than he. Even Rose… even his vessel.

She shivered, shaking her head in a desperate attempt to steer her thoughts away from the inevitabilities of the future, but she had little choice save to acknowledge that her lifespan was incredibly brief compared to Dezel's. Even if—when—they all survived this mess, he would still outlive her by several thousand years; Rose's breath caught painfully as she realized that as inextricably linked as their lives may be for now, they could not stay that way forever.

Hugged her knees to her chest, she glared fiercely at nothing; even before Dezel had set his soul on vengeance, he'd still chosen her, even though she couldn't see him—but why? Had it been just because he couldn't find anywhere else to live? Could someone fated to die within such a tiny fraction of a seraph's lifetime ever be more to them than a place of residence…?

Rose took a deep and shuddering breath, forcing herself to calm down before she got any more carried away; there was absolutely no reason for her to jump straight into despair like this. Maybe Dezel had a point, she thought wearily, burying her forehead in her knees; she had gotten a lot more insecure lately, and all that nervous energy seemed to be centered around him. The sooner they formalized their bond, the sooner she could stop fretting.

"I can feel you freaking out from here," mumbled Dezel, opening one eye, and Rose turned her head to face him so quickly her neck cracked, her heart momentarily freezing in her chest. Gods, didn't anything get past him? "Do you really need to be within arm's length of me all the time?"

Despite the sincere undercurrent carrying his dry tone, a far cry from the derision she expected, Rose glowered at him nonetheless; why must he witness all her weakest moments? "No," she snapped, before remembering that her family had not yet awakened, and lowered her voice in a hurry as she glanced around nervously. "Go back to sleep," she continued, more quietly. "I'm just… thinking, that's all."

"I thought you hated thinking," responded Dezel, sitting up, and placed his hat carefully onto his head; a warm wind wrapped around her shoulders like a blanket, and she found herself shivering despite his welcome heat. "You should try talking it out instead," he suggested. "It'll probably make you feel better, and I can listen."

Rose bowed her head. Should she risk confiding in someone so close to the heart of the matter? Insisting she was fine wouldn't do; Dezel was observant enough that she'd probably only cause him pain by trying to conceal her own. Ultimately, she had no choice but to at least try to disentangle her emotions.

"You… said you didn't hate me," she began uncertainly, unable to articulate the true nature of her anxiety. After all, how could Rose explain that she'd somehow come to care about Dezel's opinion of her on a deep enough level that it disrupted her ability to think straight? A possibility prodded at the edge of her mind, but she ignored it; this wasn't the time for distractions.

"This again?" asked Dezel, genuinely surprised, and stared her down; but Rose shifted in place restlessly, unable to meet his sightless eyes. "I told you, I can't. None of this is your fault, Rose," he insisted, leaning slightly forward and drawing her attention back to him. "Have I ever given you any reason to think otherwise?"

"No, but I mean…" she tried to explain, the heat rising automatically to her cheeks at the earnestness of his expression, but shook her head in agitation. "Why did you make me your vessel all those years ago?" she asked eventually, looking up with an effort to meet his blind eyes. "Of all the things you could have chosen, you chose me. A human. Something… mortal."

Dezel's jaw tightened as if her last phrase had been physically painful to hear, but he did not look away from her. "Of all the things I could have chosen," he murmured, "I chose you—a human—because I could tell you'd be able to handle it." He paused, gazing at her intently, as his breeze caressed her cheek. "Don't go proving me wrong, now."

"I'm not!" insisted Rose, letting out a short breath of frustration. "I just… realized a couple things, all right? I never thought too much about the far future like this before. 'Once all this is over', that kind of thing." She shook her head. "You'll live so much longer without me than you will with me—so I was wondering if you'll just slip into someone else, after I'm gone."

The words were out before she could stop them, and she gave a gasp a little like a sob, resting her fingers hesitantly on her mouth. Dezel opened his mouth slightly as if to say something, swaying in place as if hesitant, but evidently convinced himself to move and crouched next to her. "For a seraph, a vessel isn't just a place to live; it's a sacred connection between the realms," he told her sharply. "You're asking if I'm going to give away my soul."

"Well, you gave it to me," insisted Rose stubbornly, struggling to stand her ground under his stare (or sit her ground, she supposed). "Just because I could handle it, apparently." She kept the skepticism in her voice as light as she could, emphasizing his words as delicately as possible, but could not filter it out completely: his eyes might have narrowed, and he turned his face away.

Eventually, Dezel let out a long sigh, glancing back at Rose. "I gave it to you because… I saved you," he told her haltingly, reluctantly. "You might have died if not for me, so I wanted to make sure nothing like that ever happened to you again. I sensed the potential for you to grow strong, so I decided to help out." He paused. "If I find another helpless human, maybe I'll make them my vessel someday. But I…" He swallowed convulsively. "I can't replace you. Nothing can replace you."

But as he spoke of strength and potential, something stirred at the edge of Rose's memory, and she felt herself frown as though out of control of her actions… as she had been many times before, whenever Dezel's will had overpowered her own. But ever since he'd used that ability to save her life, she'd put his past transgressions out of her mind; in fact, she almost found herself accepting his unacceptable actions of the past, putting herself down in his place. Could her own petty annoyances and inadvertent hindrances really be enough to even their score…?

"Th-that's a nice sentiment and all," Rose told Dezel finally, crossing her arms in thought; there would be plenty of time to arrive at a more concrete conclusion later. "But you had to have put me in danger about a bazillion times ever since you got obsessed with vengeance," she added, watching her seraph's expression closely as it darkened. "What's up with that?"

To her astonishment, Dezel only grimaced and hid his face in his hands, rubbing his eyes with a gruntlike sigh. "I can't explain any more than I already have, and I won't apologize," he growled. "It's impossible to justify everything I've done for my friends over the years, especially to you. There's no use pressing the point."

"What happened to talking it out?" asked Rose, raising an eyebrow, but could not prevent herself from smiling slightly as her seraph shook his head in exasperation. "I thought you said it'd make me feel better."

"Yeah, but it's making me feel worse," muttered Dezel, though he did not seem any more resentful than usual. "I'm already standing trial for all this later, remember?" he pointed out, and Rose's smiled widened despite herself: he visibly relaxed at the gesture, and that in turn set her mind at ease. "So can we move on for now?"

"Selfish," chided Rose, daring to scoot slightly closer; though he wavered in place as she pushed his shoulder lightly, he did not shy away from her. "First you find a vessel you'll outlive by thousands of years, and now you won't even let her ask questions in the meantime? Shame on you."

"Now you're just picking on me," complained Dezel, though the most prominent emotion in his voice was actually relief. "This is stupid. You shouldn't be worrying about us right now. The Shepherd and the Scattered Bones need your attention a lot more, anyway."

"Believe me, I tried to give it to them," Rose sighed, shaking her head. "But I kept getting… distracted, before I actually made any progress. The farthest I got was thinking that if we're gonna get out of here, we're gonna need outside help to do it," she rushed on, before Dezel could interrupt her. "The guards'll be after us for sure, and it'll be a miracle if they don't search the inn—but getting out of here before it's dark will be dangerous, too."

Dezel pursed his lips. "The Platinum Knights are a little short of staff at the moment," he responded pointedly, and Rose's eyes widened as she suddenly recalled Lunarre's slaughter: she shuddered at the memory of blood and fire. "And Sorey and the others shouldn't be all that long behind us. It might actually be best if we waited here awhile."

Rose blinked in surprise. When was the last time Dezel had advocated for passivity? "Are you seriously suggesting we do nothing?" she asked, scratching her head. "Not that I'm against that or anything, but it seems… unlike you."

But Dezel only shrugged. "Hey, you're the boss. I'm just saying, this situation has too many outcomes to plan out effectively, so it might be a waste of time to try it." He moistened his lips in thought. "If any soldiers come here, I'll sense them, and I'll be able to tell you the safest escape route when it happens." He offered Rose an awkward grin. "Pretty handy to have a wind seraph on your side, huh."

"Yeah, and then we can wing it from there!" she exclaimed, pounding a fist into her hand, but remembered abruptly that her family still slept only after Felice stirred faintly. Rose dropped her hands into her lap and fidgeted uncomfortably; she may be the boss, but she was still the youngest: her status wouldn't prevent her family from giving her a talking-to about quiet hours.

But instead, Felice only smiled and stretched. "Morning, boss," she remarked; Rose beamed at her in relief as she realized that her voice was as clear and strong as it could be so soon after awakening: so the Elixir had helped heal her, after all. "I don't think I've ever seen you this excited this early," she added, propping herself up on one elbow. "You must have a plan."

Rose nodded resolutely. "I'll tell you once everyone else is awake," she whispered, gesturing for Felice to lie back down; Dezel smiled in her peripheral vision, and she echoed the gesture automatically. "Get some more rest if you can," she added, exchanging a glance with her seraph. "I've got a little more thinking to do."


Once everyone had awakened, several hours later, Rose's explanation went about as well as could be expected: not very. None of the Scattered Bones were especially comfortable with "waiting around to be captured again", as Eguille put it; Rose could understand their unwillingness to place their shattered trust in an invisible being, but at the same time, what better choice did they have?

"Look, I'm not going to make Dezel prove his existence by doing tricks for you like a circus dog," Rose told them all, somewhat impatiently, and crossed her arms; Dezel blinked at her in apparent surprise, but she couldn't afford to break eye contact with her family to look over at him. "Especially not after all he's done for us. If you don't want to trust him, I guess that's fine; but you should at least trust me."

There was a long silence before Talfryn finally broke it to speak for all of them, shifting uncomfortably in place. "Yes, boss," he mumbled, hanging his head like a scolded puppy. "I understand."

Rose couldn't help but smile at the gesture. "Chin up," she told him, reaching out to tap his jaw; he looked up at her, startled. "I get it, okay? The hardest work for us has always been doing nothing. But in this case, just one toe out of line could kill us all, and it's a lot harder to misstep if you don't move… right?"

Talfryn nodded, braving a smile, and the other Scattered Bones with him—and that was the end of that. The plan had been agreed upon, albeit hesitantly, and all that was left to do was carry it out. But staying put didn't mean they couldn't make any progress in other matters, however small.

"In the meantime," continued Rose, leaning down to pluck the iris gem out of her bag, "any idea where Lunarre got this beauty?" Sitting on the edge of Eguille and Rosh's bed, she tossed the spectral sphere into the air and caught it with one hand. "I mean, did he beat us to the offerings already?" she prompted, glancing around at them all curiously. "Because if so, we'll need a new plan."

Eguille shook his head haltingly. "He ransacked our stock just before he took us captive, and took everything he liked for himself," he explained bitterly. "I'd say that's the one we bought from Zod the jeweler, a few weeks ago."

Rose nodded; so the offerings would still be a good place to start. That idea certainly added another layer of complexity to their plan; but the most important thing was still to get her family out of Pendrago in one piece. After all, she could always come back later—or, depending on a number of factors, she could collaborate with Sorey and Alisha. Her heart skipped a beat as she remembered her friends; gods willing, their mission had gone as well as her own.

"So how exactly are iris gems going to save the world?" asked Talfryn, frowning, his voice breaking into her thoughts. "You kinda… skipped that part," he added, sitting down on his bed at the same time as Felice.

"I… don't actually know," admitted Rose, letting out a long breath; Dezel crossed his arms and leaned against the wall thoughtfully. "The old man told us to gather them up and bring them all to Lohgrin. He said something about knowing our enemy, but I have no idea what he meant by that, and he wouldn't explain anything."

"That sounds just like him," smiled Felice reminiscently. "Is he doing all right?" she added, more concernedly, and Rose couldn't keep herself from flinching, setting down the iris gem before she could drop it. "I don't think any of us have seen Mayvin since the day you came home with the Shepherd."

Oh no. Rose hadn't told her family about Sorey's involvement in the current state of world affairs, let alone her own; and if she confessed that the last time they'd met with Mayvin hadn't been on the best of terms, they'd probably ask all kinds of questions she couldn't hope to answer.

As great a liar as Rose could be, this had hit a little too close to home for her to make her act a convincing one: "Uh, y-yeah," she managed, grimacing by way of smile, and ran her fingers through her unkempt hair. "He's doing… great. But I'm gonna go take a bath now, okay?" added Rose hastily, seizing on the nearest distraction—doing her best to ignore the guilt flooding her heart.

"Boss?" asked Rosh, crossing his arms, and exchanged a perplexed glance with Eguille; Rose could not meet any of their curious eyes. "Are you… all right?"

"Just fine, thanks," she responded a little too quickly, offering them all an insincere salute; her eyes quickly slid to her seraph, leaning against the wall some distance away. "Oh, and Dezel, keep your winds to yourself," she ordered as an afterthought, turning around in the doorway to face him.

"Hey, that was one time," growled Dezel, and she tossed a smile over her shoulder. "And it was an accident!" He wasn't such a great liar himself, thought Rose wryly; his defensiveness was just as incriminating as all the other evidence. She considered correcting him that it had been twice now, and she wasn't sure either one had been accidental—but instead settled for giving the 'I'm-watching-you' signal, and pulled the screen in front of the doorway.

Contrary to what her family probably thought, she'd had enough of thinking for the day: Rose had already stressed herself out more than enough, what with considering the myriad uncertainties of the distant future. No; it was time to see if she could relax long enough to rediscover the feeling she'd lost upon awakening—that all was well between herself and her seraph… and that maybe, if this luck held up, everything else would turn out okay, too.


Speaking of chapters that go on longer than expected, I actually had to split this one in two! Jeez, I just can't cut their interactions short, can I?

AngryReptileKeeper: You really didn't have to go to all that trouble just to review, but thanks anyway! Do try not to drool on my story, though, haha.

N: Oh yeah, we're definitely getting closer to an upgrade, but there are still quite a few complications to hash out. And if they stay in a ritzy inn after all this is over, which I could totally see (assuming such a thing exists in Glenwood), I'll stick it in the sidequest story! I get the feeling a lot of those chapters will be written and posted after this tale is done, though. For being as scatterbrained as I am, I sure have a one-track mind sometimes.

Straya: As this chapter showed, Rose unfortunately keeps finding things to think about that just barely miss that mark. I really wish I could stop her from doing that, because if you're starting to get impatient for them to get together, imagine how I feel writing it. But please, by all means, add shirtless Dezel to your art list!