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We've established whether I own Hetalia or not, but to all those confused, no, I don't own Hetalia.
JA pahardžać jaho - Bel - I despise him
tupień - Bel - dumbass
mudak - Bel - asshole
Frau, Fraulein - Ger - Lady, Woman
Chapter 16
Natalya stared into the leaves, watched the sunlight dance yellow between the cool green blades. Her fingers rubbed idly against the inscriptions on her Keshi, and her mind was...blank. She was thinking too many things at one time, then nothing at all, all at random.
She just wanted to be alone. She was born alone, and for the longest time, she had lived alone. And for a short while ago, she had been more alone than she'd ever felt in her life. For some reason, she found loneliness comforting, but the part of her that refused to feel sorry for her said that if these people all went away, she'd miss their company.
So she refused to think about loneliness, and knew that no matter how tightly she closed her eyes, her life would not return to what it was. When she'd picked up his journal and read it from end to end, she'd sealed her fate then and there.
How her fingers itched for a fight. Finding who he was talking about hadn't been easy - Nat had to travel through Realms, search for clues in libraries, and fight and fight until the numbness become a companion rather than a stranger. No, finding Johnny Doe hadn't been easy at all.
But everything that happened afterwards...somehow, she didn't feel like she was ignoring the numbness that had settled inside her heart like a lead anchor in a sea of ice, one that had been dropped the day of his funeral. She didn't even see it as a companion anymore - no, it was not that. Now, it was as if...the sea of ice was finally melting, and the anchor was finally going to be able to move again.
Elizabeta. Gilbert. Matt. Alfred. Shree. Maybe this was his way of making sure that she wasn't lonely ever again. The day he'd taken her with him, he'd promised her he'd make sure she was never lonely again. She'd never known him to break a promise. Maybe...maybe it was his will.
"Natalya! There you are!"
Nat got up, and saw Elizabeta running towards her. She'd finally been found. Nat watched Eliza run up to the car, and look up at her on the roof. "What are you doing there?"
Nat itched to say 'Being alone', which would no doubt make her leave, but Nat knew that it would genuinely hurt Eliza, and she liked the older woman a lot more than she let on. It was hard not to get close to the only woman she'd been travelling with for a very long time, a woman who made sure that there was a blanket on Nat every time she dozed off.
Nat swung her legs to one side, and jumped off the roof of the car. "What happened?"
"Oh, nothing. No one knew where you were, so...I was wondering if...you were fine..."
Nat couldn't resist a smile. She was as bad as Katyusha in worrying about her. "I'm fine. Do you want me to show you around this place?"
"You've been here before?" Eliza asked, surprised.
Nat removed her coat and wrapped it around her waist. "It's really hot," she muttered, and looked at Eliza. "I've been here once or twice. The first time was when I was appointed as the Deputy's Student, a couple of years ago. I'd got a guided tour then, so if we get lost...well..."
"I'm sure we can ask someone," Eliza said cheerily.
That was another thing Nat liked about Eliza. Unlike Shree's cheeriness, which could mean one of many things, ranging from I'm-hyper-crazy-happy to I'm-going-to-make-you-into-a-shish-kebab-and-feed-you-to-your-dogs, Eliza's cheery meant I'm happy. Her angry meant I'm angry. She was surprisingly straightforward, and Nat knew that she trusted Eliza to tell her the truth. "Yes, I'm sure we can."
The entire campus of the temple was beautiful. Nat talked a little about all the places they came about, and the first thing Eliza noticed were the number of trees there were. There were trees all over the place, and the area under each tree was cleared off. Most trees had benches under them; other trees had a low compound under them, probably made for sitting as well.
"Here, they take lessons underneath the trees," Nat explained, noticing where Eliza's attention had turned. "But they're under specific trees, and the lessons taught under certain trees are specific as well. The properties of the tree enhances certain thoughts, so only those lessons are taught under them."
"Are there no classrooms here?" Eliza asked in wonder.
"Nope. The classes are either taken under the tree, or in the temple. Have you seen the temple, inside?"
"Oh, no, not yet."
"Let's go, then," Nat said, and led the way. From anywhere within the campus, the roof of the inner sanctum sanctorum could be seen. It was a tapering roof, and until then all the roofs of the sanctum sanctorum that Eliza had seen carried idols of demons and Gods, but this one was...plain.
"This roof is simple," Eliza commented to Nat.
Nat chuckled. "Wait till you see the inside."
-O-
Eliza gasped.
The temple was huge.
The entrance of the temple opened into a large, square shaped yard with corridors and rooms on four sides, and the sanctum sanctorum in the middle, at a distance from the entrance, which, in itself, was huge. It seemed to have four entrances - Eliza could only see people entering and leaving from three, and guessed the fourth. Other than the large corridors on the periphery of the yard, the rest of it was open to the blue skies above. The uncovered pathway was large enough to accommodate enormous trees and still have enough space for five people to walk in a line on either side of them.
The temple reverberated with the sounds of chanting, and Eliza could see scores of students sitting before an elderly priest, avidly listening to him or repeating what she was saying. Eliza could see people from outside, too, coming to take their fill of the sacred deity within the sanctum sanctorum.
"Let's sit for a while," Nat said, climbing onto the peripheral corridors, which were at a height from the uncovered pathways. She held her hand out for Eliza to hold. "We have walked quite a lot."
Eliza took her hand, and pulled herself on the raised platform. They walked a little, and sat down.
"This place is so...peaceful," Eliza said, letting the chime of bells and the beats of mantras wash over her senses.
"True," Nat said. "They focus more on increasing their spiritual powers. The more advanced studies take place in temples."
"How is this different from your temple?" Eliza asked, curious.
Nat laughed. "Oh, very. For one, people are very strict here, and" -
"Makes you wonder how I became head priest, doesn't it?"
Eliza looked up to see Mathias Køhler, but her eyes met crimson eyes instead. Her heart slowed a little, paused, almost, before beating faster - every time was just like the first time. Those crimson eyes smiled at her, invited her in, threatened to swallow her whole. And Eliza...Eliza couldn't -
Nat grimaced at Mathias. "What are you doing here?"
"It is my temple, Natalya. I was just showing Dr Beilschmidt around. Something in the book he was reading caught his eye, and he wanted to clarify it with me. May I sit down?"
"It is your temple, Køhler," Nat muttered, and turned to Gilbert and Lukas, who were standing behind Mathias. "Where are the others?"
"Matt is in the library, and Shree is with Alfred," Gilbert said. "But why worry about them when the awesome me is here?" He walked over to where Eliza was sitting, and sat down beside her. Lukas took his place next to Mathias, who was sitting next to Nat.
"This place is the same from the last time I came here," Nat said, the venom in her voice gone, her eyes taken in by the bittersweet nostalgia. "Maybe there are a few more trees, but..."
Mathias sighed, and looked at the sky. "No matter how many years go, and how many of us Head Priests and Deputies come, this place will be standing, still the same. But if you say things like that, Natalya, it doesn't reflect well on me as a Head Priest."
"Well, it would reflect worse on you if you actually did something to change this place, considering your level of thoughtfulness and foresight," Nat said, looking at Mathias. She turned to Lukas, who was glaring holes into her head. "Relax, Lukas. I was joking. As much as JA pahardžać jaho, I wouldn't have anyone else to be in his position."
Mathias and Lukas both looked surprised. Mathias, the first to recover, smiled softly at Nat. "You've grown up, Natalya."
"And so have you, Køhler. You're not as much of a tupień as you used to be. No fun in making fun of you anymore, actually," Nat said almost regretfully.
Mathias gave his loud, characteristic boom of a laugh and patted Nat's back with unnecessary strength, enough to make Nat snarl at him. "Aww, Natalya, don't say that."
"Hands off me, mudak."
"Okay, okay," Mathias said good-humouredly, and smiled at Nat. "I wonder what he'd say if he saw you, today."
Mathias watched as her face fell, his eyes also picking up Eliza and Gilbert watching her. The proud, silver-blond haired beauty before him struggled with her emotions, and Mathias understood what Shree had told him the day before.
"It's not like she'll not talk about it, Mathias...it's just that...see, whenever the topic comes, her face just...falls. And I don't know about others, but when that happens in front of me, I don't have the heart to tell her anything more or ask her anything more."
But Mathias knew that Nat needed to talk about how she felt, if not to him, then to somebody who would understand. He watched as she recovered herself and got her emotions under her control. Her breath moved out of her in a long exhale, and she looked at him with a smile, a smile that made him truly understand why she was the Deputy of the second strongest Warrior House in the World. "He's tease me, and tell me I'm still a baby, no matter how much others say I've grown up."
You wonderful woman, Mathias thought, as proud of her as he would ever be. You truly wonderful woman.
"The land I come from is nothing like this one. We see colours you could never see, take forms you cannot imagine, and enjoy a life you could never experience."
Shree, next to me, nodded as she listened. The demon - I called him Tony - had taken the form of an alien. You know, almond shaped head, small red eyes, white from top to bottom, the works. He'd seen it in one of the books that I'd picked up at a store on our way here. Shree had laughed the first couple of times she had to encounter Tony like this, but then she'd gotten used to it, and could hold serious conversations with him.
"Our people are different from your people. Your people stay in one form, bound to it, unable to escape it until death. Ours...we're the same as our surroundings. You do not experience that here, since you are distinct from your surroundings. But...that's not true for us. Our people...flow into one another. Moda...that's your word for the mind, yes?"
Shree nodded. "It's a little more complex than that, but yes, I think you and I mean the same thing. Moda is more like...consciousness."
"Consciousness. Our minds were distinct from each other. We flowed in the same river of consciousness, yet we were distinct drops of water. When it suited us, we took on a form. That is how it is in my world."
I...I couldn't have imagined it. Yet, I knew what he was talking about - Tony and I were like that, like two distinct drops. But we weren't in a river - no, we were a puddle. He was one half, and I was the other - there was no way for someone else to tell us apart, but we knew ourselves distinctly from our indistinguishable form. I couldn't have imagined something like that any other time, but now...now I knew what he was talking about.
"And each mind has its own name. Each mind can be distinguished from one another by its name. That is how we take our separate forms. That is how we are summoned from the river of consciousness."
"You have a different word for it, too, don't you?" Shree said, rocking back and forth. "Jhenizso...that's what you call it, right?"
"Priestess...you have guessed my home?"
I looked from Shree to Tony. There wasn't much room on Tony's current form for him to really be able to express himself through...well, expressions, but I knew what he was feeling. I should, because he was in my freaking head.
But Shree caught the drift, too. She continued to rock back and forth, but the expression in her eyes had changed. She was no longer a listener, and I was having the same feeling Tony was having - She knew something.
"Not really...but I have a feeling," Shree murmured softly. Honestly, for all her clear, readable expressions, Shree Sharma was one unreadable gal.
"A feeling..." Tony said softly. "Why would you want to know?"
"We are going to meet a man, Tony," Shree said. She'd rocked slower and slower, and now she was still, but her arms were wrapped around her knees, covering everything except her eyes from where I was looking. "And this man has been to almost all the Realms, even though he's a few years elder to me...maybe seven. He is a spiritual prodigy, a man who has intimate knowledge about each Realm. And if I can believe the rumors, then maybe...maybe he could help us return you back to your home Realm, so that this part of you can reunite with the rest of you back home."
"But I am bound to Johnny Doe's moda" -
"True. But I believe this man will find us a way around that. The longer you stay in here, Tony, the worse it will get for you and Alfred. And I don't want anything to happen to either of you."
"Can this man help us?" Tony asked. I knew his desperation. He knew what the situation was. People in his Realm had put a bounty on my head, but they didn't know that if I died, he would die along with me. And all he wanted to do was to go back home. And I didn't blame him - Tony actually had a place to call home. Maybe if I did, too, I'd go back just as fast as he wanted to right now.
"I'm sure he can, some way or another," Shree assured.
Tony grew quiet. I knew what he was thinking, and he knew what I was thinking. Whatever the reason was, I completely trusted Shree to know what she was doing. Shree wouldn't lie to either of us, and I trusted her to know that. And while Tony still maintained that he didn't trust anyone except Natalya, I knew his mind had changed towards Shree, that he trusted her, maybe if not as much as I did, but enough to help out here. I didn't have to tell him that in so many words - he knew what to do, and I knew what he was going to do.
"I trust you, Shree," he said slowly.
"I won't break your trust, Tony," she replied.
"My home is the fifth planet of the third star of Recemes. Do you know where that is?"
"No," Shree said as she straightened, and smiled at both of us. "But I know someone who does."
-O-
"Eliza, look at this awesomeness."
And try as she might, she couldn't look at it - she was looking at it, but she was looking at him more. He was pointing at some plants with one hand and running the fingers of his other hand under the letters on the page of the book open on his lap and talking animatedly the entire time, punctuating each sentence with enough awesome, but Eliza didn't seem to be able to understand anything beyond the way his eyes flashed and his voice danced and his expressions changed from one degree of happiness to the other.
The truth was that she could listen to him for a lot longer than others gave her credit for. In fact, that was how they'd got to know each other - as soon as Gilbert found out he had an attentive listener in Eliza, all he did was talk about medicine, medicine and more medicine. Eliza knew what he was saying, because her mother was in a hospital for as long as she remembered, and the hospital had become more of a home to her than the shack of an apartment that she lived in.
Her parents were happy people - they truly loved each other, and loved Eliza, their only daughter. But after her mother was diagnosed with middle stage cancer when she was three, their life went slowly from riches to rags, with her father having to sell his belongings one after the other to cure the woman he loved, and to provide the best for the child who meant more than life to him. She was born with a golden spoon in her mouth, and her father was determined to ensure that Eliza never felt want for anything in her life.
Her mother never got better, and her father never gave up hope. As time progressed, however, he had to accept that Eliza needed to see their life for what it was. Unbeknownst to him, Eliza knew long before he had decided to expose her to that side of the world.
The cancer had spread from her breasts to the rest of her body. And when Eliza's mother got to know it was in her brain, she stopped her husband from selling away anything that remained of their possessions. But he was not going to give up, and that was when Johnny Doe came into Eliza's life.
Alfred Jones Sr answered her father's letter by turning up at the door of their apartment one day, and took it on himself to raise Eliza as his own daughter, in the way her father would have wanted to. He offered to pay for the comfort of her mother on her deathbed, but her father had too much pride to ask that of him. A year after Alfred Jones Sr took Eliza under his wing, her mother died. A month later, her father followed.
Johnny Doe had given her everything. He'd given her an education, a job, a way of life...and this wonderful man who sat before her. For all of Gilbert's...grievances in the department of social etiquette, Eliza had known him long enough to know exactly what kind of a man he was, and what exactly she could expect from him. But after they'd set out with Natalya, things weren't the same.
Natalya...the more time she spent with her, the more confused she got as to who was right and who was wrong. Finally, Nat took her to a side and told her, "I do not know what kind of a man he was to you. He was a good man to you, and you can hate me for taking him away from you. He took everything away from me, but that is not why I am here. I am here because I do not want him to take away anything more from anyone else. And after everything that has happened, Eliza, you cannot close your eyes and tell me that what I tell you now is a lie."
And that changed it for her. She knew what Nat said was right. For Eliza, he provided her with everything she'd taken. And for Nat...everyone else seemed to know what she'd lost, and refused to speak about it. Eliza was a curious kind of person, but after seeing Nat's expression whenever anyone mentioned it, Eliza didn't have the heart to ask the girl about it. And Nat was a lot of things, and one of them happened to be a genuinely good person.
But now...she looked up, and saw Gilbert bending over his book, reading something out for her convenience. All she could register was the way his hair fell straight onto his forehead, and how soft it looked. It's not that she wasn't interested, it was just that...she wanted something else now.
Her attention snapped to the present when she heard the book closing, and she focused her attention to what was going on before her. Gilbert had shut the book, and looked at her. "You seem distracted, frau. What is it?"
Honestly, it was the gentleness of his tone that got to her. He rarely showed that side of him, but when he did... "I don't know. I was just thinking about a lot of things..."
Gilbert put the book down on the bench, and sat up on the table. "Come here."
"Gilbert, get down! What if" -
"Frau, come sit next to me."
"Not on the table!"
"Fine, then. Come lie down next to me."
Eliza felt herself blushing, and Gilbert used the lack of protest to pull her up. Finding herself with no option that didn't draw any more attention to herself, Eliza sat on the bench, and let Gilbert lay her down next to him. The bench was huge - they could accommodate another person on either side of them comfortably.
She watched the leaves dance before her, soothing greens and yellows and browns and oranges, slowly coming together and blending until she vaguely realized her eyes were shutting. Letting them close, she listened to the sound around her - the sound of her breath, the sound of his breath, the sound of the leaves rustling slowly, the sound of birds, the chanting from the temples.
His breathing was slow and even next to her, and the sound of it sent her into a semi-asleep state. Her arms and legs felt heavy, but she could clearly process all the sounds around her with ease.
"Are you tired, frau?"
"Not really," she whispered back. "It's been a while since I've indulged my laziness."
He chuckled. The low, throaty sound ran over her skin. "Frau, if nothing else, you are the most hardworking woman I know. Apart from the awesome me, of course."
Eliza snorted. "Of course."
"What were you thinking about?" he whispered.
"I don't know. All sorts of things," she murmured, and turned her head, opening her eyes. "Hey, what do you think makes Nat so sad when they all talk about that particular person?"
Gilbert turned to face her, and she could make out the shards of black and bright red in his eyes. "I don't know. I thought about it some times, but...and I don't feel like asking, either. Her face is so sad whenever..."
"Yes, I know. I feel the same way," she whispered. "And no one really asks her about it. I feel it's better if she tells us about it herself."
"Ja. That is better," Gilbert said, and looked into Eliza's eyes keenly. "But that wasn't the only thing on your mind, fraulein."
Oh, how well he knew her. "I was thinking about...Johnny Doe."
Sorrow seeped into Gilbert's eyes. "I miss him."
"Yes, I do, too."
"It felt like if he was there, everything would be alright. But, the more I go through this...journey, the more I realize how little I knew. Fraulein, as his personal physician, I had never seen the tattoo on his back."
The image of the purple lotus tattoo that they had seen on Johnny Doe's burnt body flashed to her mind. "I had never seen it either. The first time I did see it...It feels so long ago, sometimes, doesn't it."
"Makes me feel old," Gilbert complained. "That is not awesome."
Eliza giggled at the look on Gilbert's face. "I think it's pretty awesome, to grow old. Sometimes, the older you are, the more you know."
"But, still, Eliza, that is not what you were thinking, either."
Eliza frowned. "What do you mean?"
"You were thinking..." he leaned forward, and before she could register, placed a light kiss on her lips, "...about this."
The blush which covered her face like a wildfire signalled her understanding of what had happened. "W-What?"
Gilbert grinned, his eyes narrowing. "The older you are, the more you know," he murmured, throwing back her words right at her. "And the Head Priest, too. I know what you think of him."
"Oh really?" Eliza said, her tongue running over where his lips had met hers.
"Ja. And I find it very unawesome, let me tell you."
A sudden pit of fire opened in her stomach, and she felt her sensibilities plunge into a never-ending abyss. "What are you going to do about it?"
"This." And with that, he closed the space between the two of them.
"The fifth planet of the third star of Recemes. What does that tell you?"
Mathias frowned. "Not a lot," he said, "but I have a feeling Braginsky would know."
"Did you send that letter?" Shree asked him.
Mathias grinned at her. "I was waiting for you to figure out where exactly the demon was from."
"And how did you know I'd do it by the time you got around to sending a letter to Braginsky?" Shree asked him, looking at the much taller man under half-drawn eyes.
"I know you, Shree." He place his hand on the wall behind Shree, and leaned before her, until her back was against the wall, and a couple of inches of air between the two of them. "I know you all too well."
"And I you, Mathias," Shree said, her low, throaty laugh only for their ears. But there could possibly be no one else there - they'd met in one of the most secluded portions of the temple campus. "And I know exactly what you're doing here."
Mathias stared at her with such heat in his eyes that Shree could feel something old and deeply buried stirring back to life. "And what's that?"
"Trying to see if I'll take the bait, like I did before," she murmured, leaning forward until their lips were close enough to feel the breath of the other. "I'm not as inexperienced as before, Mathias." Her eyes moved slowly from his lips to his blue eyes. "And I'm not as stupid, either."
"Oh, no, Shree," he murmured. "I always found you to be one of the most intelligent creatures I'd ever laid my eyes on. And one of the most gorgeous, too," he whispered, closing the distance.
Shree turned her head so that Mathias's lips touched her cheek. "More gorgeous than Lukas?"
She felt him stiffen, and inwardly cackled with glee. She leaned back until her back touched the wall, and tilted her head at Mathias. "There are other ways to get someone's attention, Mathias. And that doesn't involve breaking my heart. Or Luke's, for that matter," she said. "You know why Nat detests you, don't you? You hurt everyone closest to her. Me, Luke, Ivan...even him."
"I thought I made amends, Shree," Mathias whispered, his body language changing drastically, enough for Shree to be able to see right through his heart, a broken spirit that had never quite healed. "I really thought I had."
"Well, I forgave you, Ivan did, he did, and...so did Lukas, actually," Shree said. "But, Mathias, Nat will never forgive you for one simple reason."
Mathias' eyes filled with contrite. "I know. And trust me, Shree, I've tried. I" -
"All you have to do, Mathias, is corner him like this and, instead of including so much verbal foreplay, just kiss him until he can't see straight," Shree advised, and straightened. Mathias removed his arm from next to her head, and straightened as well.
"Nat won't forgive you until you make amends with Lukas, not as his superior, but as his lover," Shree said as she walked around him.
"I know, Shree, I know," he said as he walked her out. They walked in silence, Shree looking around, Mathias lost in his own thoughts.
"There he is," he heard her murmur, and looked up to see a figure practicing katas on his own, in the middle of the garden. His blond hair nearly fell over his shoulder, and swung in the air as he turned and pivoted gracefully. His form was fantastic - Mathias could not pick out any mistakes or weaknesses in his movements. His eyes moved to Shree, and something clicked.
"Matthew," he whispered, and Shree looked up at him. "I'll go and relieve him of his training," she said. "Nat told me he's been at it since dawn."
"Woah," Mathias exclaimed. "It's almost afternoon now."
Shree nodded. "See you, Mathias," she said, and turned to leave.
"Hey, Shree?"
She turned back to him. "Yes?"
"Didn't you feel anything...back there?"
Shree grinned. "You idiot. I got over you a long time back."
Mathias feigned hurt. "You could be a little less brutal, Shree."
Shree laughed. "Besides," she said naughtily before rushing off, "blue eyes excite me, and I've found myself the perfect shade of blue."
-O-
"Boo!"
Matt turned around mid punch, and his fist stopped inches off Shree's nose. The intense focus in his eyes dissipated instantly, and he lowered his arm. "Oh my God, Shree, I'm sorry" -
"No, no, don't be. It was stupid of me to spook you like that," Shree said, brushing it off. "So. How long are you planning to punch air here?"
Matt straightened and smiled at her. "I don't know. There wasn't much else to do, and everyone seems busy. I met the pries - Natalya a while ago, but she seemed to want to be alone. Then you were busy with Alfred, and now Mr Køhler" -
"You saw that?" Shree asked, a faint pink coming to her cheeks.
"Before the two of you came out of the alcove or after?" Matt asked, rubbing his face with the towel he'd hung from a low branch.
"You saw," Shree muttered.
"I wasn't supposed to?" Matt asked.
"He was testing me."
"What for?"
"To see if I would...behave the way I would before. He's my...ex, in a way."
"Ohh," Matt said. "Is it something you talk about?"
"No...and yes," Shree said. "No, because almost everyone knows what I and he were doing."
"And what was that?"
"You remember how I told you why Nat didn't like him?"
"Because he made fun of Warrior Houses and how they seemed to view relaxation on rules as something which allowed them to have whatever kind of relationships they liked?"
"Yes, that. The thing was - still is, in fact - that he is in love with Lukas."
Matt's eyes widened. "His Deputy?"
"Yeah," Shree said. "And initially, he used to hang around with me to make him jealous. He told me his intentions, but somewhere along the line, I got carried away," Shree said sheepishly. "And that's when I told Nat about him and me."
Matt sat down on a low branch, and held out his hand to Shree. Her hand tightly clasping his, he pulled her up to the branch next to him. "I don't think she took it well."
"No, she didn't, because she knew for a fact that Lukas loved Mathias. And that's when I sobered up and stopped being naive. I told Mathias that he was hurting everyone around him, and that I didn't want to be a part of it. He was cool with it, or at least outwardly. There was a formal function a week later, and it usually ends with complete relaxation of rules, so we drank and ate food items we usually didn't eat. Mathias drank a bit too much, and...he made that statement. The problem wasn't his statement - the problem was as to whom it was pointed at. It was pointed at me, my brother and a few other close friends of Nat's, who were in love with each other. And, at that time, Lukas was in the House of Snow, a Warrior House, so it was pointed at him, too."
"He shifted Houses because of that?" Mathias asked, shocked. "You can do that?"
"Two years of our five years had passed, so Lukas was allowed to do that. But the problem...actually, it's not a problem, it's a...situation, of some type. The situation is that you can shift from a Warrior House to an Academic House, but not the other way around. He made that declaration, in not too many words, in relation to something else Mathias had said drunkenly, after which Mathias said what he did. And the coat hanger wasn't the only thing Natalya threw at him - she threw an entire table, plus an entire table's worth of items at Mathias. She wasn't as sober as she could have been, too, so it didn't connect as well, but...the coat hanger finally connected. Mathias understood what he'd said an apologized immediately, but...Nat could never forgive him for what he did to Lukas. Not the House changing part - the part where he never made it clear to Lukas how much he actually cared for him. And, I guess he'll only be forgiven after he makes amends, I guess," Shree finished. "That's the whole story. Short version of it, at least."
"Didn't any of you react the way she did, when he said that?"
"We were all tipsy. We figured they were both joking, but Nat was sober enough to know that both of them were serious. When Lukas applied for change of House, that's when we got to know how serious things were."
"And what about him? Do you still like him?"
Shree snorted. "Good Lord, no. I might have had a major crush on him for a while, but I didn't really...it was never serious. But it was enough for me to know that relationships are meant to be taken seriously by those involved in them, and not something that one person cares about and another completely ignores. After that, I either never had the time, or never...went looking," she shrugged. She looked at him. "What about you? Have you ever been that close to someone?"
Matt laughed. "I've never had the time. I met my father around the same time as I hit puberty, and I was busy from the moment he took us in. There have been suitors, but...I wasn't interested, really. It's really boring on my end, but, then again, it usually is."
"I don't think you're boring," Shree said, swinging her legs.
"Really?" he asked her, and suddenly remembered something. "Oh, yeah. I had to give you this," he said, fishing for something in his pocket. Shree heard the clinking of metal, and watched as he pulled out a long chain with a cube at the end. He bunched it into his hand, and put it in hers. "This is for you."
Shree opened her palm, and picked up the cube in the other arm. "Oh, wow," she whispered in awe as she observed the dull yellow cube. "What is...wait, is that a chandrakala?" she said, peering through the thumb-sized cube. "Oh my God. How did you" -
Matt smiled pleasantly. "Raj told me that it was one of your favourite flowers, but it didn't grow anywhere except at the Shankha Mandira. He said it was one of the things you missed when you left the Shankha Mandira, and the first thing you'd go to see when you return. The flowers are rare, and you hated plucking them...While I was searching for blooms on the ground, the most perfect bloom broke off the plant and fell down. So...I decided to preserve it and make it for" -
"Thank you!" Shree said, tears in her eyes, and flung herself at Matt. Both of them lost their balance on the narrow branch and tumbled down, Shree upon Matt. Matt lifted his head, rubbing the bump on his head that was about to become a pain-in-the-neck, but when he saw the way Shree was looking at the flower...he smiled. It was all worth it - including the bump on his head.
"This is beautiful, Matt," Shree whispered in a tone of gratefulness he had never heard from her. "Thank you so much." She put the chain around her neck, still completely unaware of her body over Matt's. She looked at Matt, and Matt could see the black rims of her brown eyes, encircling her irises like an outline. She leaned forward, and kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you so much, Matt."
And as she looked from the flower which was a keepsake of her mother, into the blue eyes whose shade she'd come to seek out whenever she entered a room, she agreed with herself on one thing.
Matthew Williams Fitzgerald wasn't boring at all.
A/T: You may be able to see where this is going.
It's been a hectic week - I've been getting up at 5 in the morning to study, and I've been exercising, so my body is just...it shuts down by 8:30 or 9 in the evening.
This chapter is longer than most...it wasn't supposed to be this long, but I wanted scenes which involved two-character-interactions...and Eliza's story just...slipped out, I guess. I realised that the last chapter was boring (if you were looking for action) but if I were to rush the pace any more than I already am, then things...wouldn't really work. I'm surprised I've come to this point in 16 chapters, but...yeah. I can't rush it, so please bear with me.
Life is hectic...but I like it a lot better than where I was a couple of months ago. A hell lot more, actually.
I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did.
Lots of Love,
R. K. Iris.