Chapter 222

Nadia's POV

Stretching and yawning widely, Nadia strained her arms out towards the other side of the bed to try to find Laila. She slapped her arms around a few times before cracking open a groggy eye and seeing from the light coming through the curtains of her room that she was alone in bed.

She hadn't woken up alone in a week. Laila was always with her, and when she wasn't, Nadia generally fell asleep downstairs, dropping off the moment Laila was taken by one of her parents.

Yawning again, she forced herself to throw the covers back. It was warm in the room, and it felt like it must have come from the sun outside. She was almost naked from last night. Valkyrie had been tired and in a lot of pain but she enjoyed sleeping without clothes and Nadia rather enjoyed it too. They had at least worn underwear to respect Elder Deuce. Although she very much doubted he'd be impressed by their bending of his rules.

She grabbed her towel and went to the bathroom, taking the unexpected free time to wash, shave for the first time in weeks and pluck her eyebrows before finally sighing and deciding she'd wasted enough time went back to her room to dress. She'd missed her last few therapy sessions and she could feel a lot of her progress undoing. Looking after Laila constantly was difficult, and she felt the constant stress Valkyrie was under. It was difficult – trying to help Laila grow and holding her whole life in her hands, fearing someone would come and kidnap them again, or kill them outright. The pit in her stomach that came back at the same moment she felt relief and joy that Valkyrie had gotten home. She knew enough, was smart enough, to know that she associated Valkyrie with difficult conversations. With terror and pain and anxiety. Her job was difficult and Nadia wanted to keep her head above water but it was grating on her mental health faster than anything had before. The pressure of being a full time caretaker not only made it worse, but made her resent her position at times. Resent her choices.

She wore a bra and a crop top, skirt and sandals. It was perhaps a little showy, but Nadia didn't mind. It was cute, it was hot outside, and it made her feel a bit better about herself. And since Laila wasn't with her at least for the next few minutes, that meant one of her parents had her and Nadia could do what she wanted for the first time in a long time. Even if she didn't have Valkyrie with her.

She took her engagement ring and put it on her finger before opening the large curtains and shamelessly admired it in the sun. Valkyrie had truly found her a gorgeous ring. Her mother had switched hers twice in the years since she married her father. Simply updating it with the styles of the time, and with her new financial situation. But Nadia couldn't imagine changing the diamond flower on her finger. It was incredible, sparkled wonderfully, and was unique.

Sighing a final time, she fixed a smile on her face and left her room to find Laila.

She ended up being in the kitchen, sitting on the table and attempting to eat porridge with her hands. She was covered in it.

"Hey Tanith," Nadia smiled kindly. "How are you this morning?"

"I'm alright, thanks," she said, sipping her tea. "Did you sleep well?"

"Yeah, it was good. Where's Valkyrie?"

"She already left with Dexter and Skulduggery. They're going after those teenagers with the powers from Argeddion."

"Oh, okay."

"Are you okay, Nadia? I can't imagine how hard this is on you," Tanith frowned.

She threw a grin at her. "What? No, I'm fine. Are you going to be here all day? I was thinking of visiting the renovation and I need to go over the library with the carpenter and Gordon," she said, grabbing a glass of orange juice. When it was hot, she struggled to eat breakfast. She'd make up for it with a large lunch and some snacks though. She was proud of her weight gain and felt ten times better where she was now. For a few weeks she'd felt gross, as if she was too large for her skin, but then she got settled into her patterns and bought clothes – with Valkyrie's hard earned money – that weren't two sizes too small, and now she was happy with herself. She ate as and when she wanted, at a healthy weight. None of her bones showed and her collar bone was no longer pronounced. "Gordon's worried the new house won't have enough room for all the artwork he has."

"How much does he have?"

"Over a hundred pieces. More than he had hanging up before the renovation started," said Nadia, leaning against the counter. She didn't sit down even when Laila moaned at her to sit. Her clothes were too nice for Laila's messy hands! "To be honest, I'm not sure how much we're going to keep and he's getting sort of upset with me over it."

"He's generally quite laidback," Tanith commented slowly. "Maybe he's just struggling with losing control?"

"Mm," Nadia nodded. "I suppose it's the first time he's had to give up so much control since he died. It's, like, a visual thing, isn't it? He can't escape the change or control any part, and he's upset."

"That doesn't mean he should take it out on you though," she said softly. Nadia nodded at her orange juice, the hypocrisy keenly obvious to them both. "Did you decide what to do with the garden?"

"Oh, yeah, that was a few weeks ago. They've started it already. It's so close to being finished, except for the glass actually growing obviously. We decided to keep it natural and just seed it. It saves thousands of euro's and it'll only take a few weeks for all the grass to grow in. It'll hardly stop weeds from growing anyway so it doesn't matter."

"We'll have to get into gardening," Tanith joked.

"I really want to," Nadia smiled. "It'll be like a hobby. I want to get some broccoli seeds. Have you ever seen a broccoli flower? It's so pretty! And bee's love it. I want to have some beehives and ladybug hides too. I'm not organising any of that until the inside stuff is done though."

"Yeah."

"I need to order the new mattresses too. I think I have the company decided, I just haven't done it."

"That'll be good. Make sure you're taking breaks too. I know looking after Laila can be tiring. Thank you for caring for her so much, by the way. I do really appreciate it. And so does Ghastly."

"I know," she nodded. "It's okay, I don't mind."

She smiled. "Well, I still appreciate it. After all of… I'd like to make it up to you. And to Valkyrie. Neither of you had to help me so much with Laila, but you've done so much. It means a lot to me."

She put her drink down and hugged Tanith from behind, not letting Laila get her hands on her. "It's okay. I really don't mind. You're Valkyrie's sister, and I love Laila. Just tell me all your gossip and stay alive and I'll keep doing it."

Tanith laughed. "Sure, I can do that."

Lenka's and Militsa's voices filtered through the house and they separated. Nadia put on the kettle just as they came in. Lenka immediately gushed over Laila, who was glad to finally have some more attention on her considering how utterly deprived she'd been when Tanith and Nadia had been talking, while Militsa helped her with the tea. At some point, Aine called her to talk and before she knew what was happening, she'd agreed to visit the renovation with them all and they were getting in the car together to meet Aine at the house.

The heat of the sun was wonderful on her skin; it made her miss India. She wished she'd had more time to truly appreciate that. She knew Valkyrie would love it in India. And when she had made up with her family and they liked Valkyrie again, she knew they'd visit almost every year and soak up the sun. It was a nice, comfortable fantasy she liked to enjoy sometimes.

"It looks amazing," Militsa gasped.

"The front is just about done," Nadia commented, looking around Laila and out of the window at the treeline. They'd added some new trees along the edge of the woods in a straight line to make a significantly more pruned look, and the front garden between the house and front wall was now entirely flat up until the house itself, which had a single raised, tiered flower bed against the house, and one below that where it became flat, giving them two flower beds. Trees lined the front wall at a safe distance for growing in safely, primarily trees that wouldn't lose their leaves in winter for privacy, alongside rocks, taller oaks and other trees, bushes and shrubs. There was another flowerbed along the whole wall, lined with rocks like all the others, although smaller since there as it wasn't a tier, and it would grow in to have a much more wild look over the years to come. She was going to add a beehive and bird boxes. Massive patches of dirt remained, where dirt had been added and removed to make it flat. Luckily for the price, it hadn't been too bad at the front, just a few little bumps and holes they shuffled around. "They haven't put in the flower boxes on the windows."

"Aw, that'll look so sweet," Militsa complimented.

"Thank you," she smiled. "I want to see if they're done with the extension at the back."

They piled out and there was a lot of explaining Nadia told them about, pointing things out, and Aine joined them from her taxi, silently smiling and waving her greetings.

Around the left of the house, they could immediately see the side had been tiered with dirt they'd finally been able to bring onto the property and spread. Large rocks had been artfully placed. Flowers and shrubs would be added to the thin areas soon, and the larger areas would be lawn. A few trees had already been placed, and the handful that were already there were either protected with tape or now completely cut down and removed so they'd have more light into the windows, which was of course a must. They had at least planted twice as many as they'd removed which made Nadia happier.

The extension was obviously finished from the outside, and it made Nadia grin. They walked around it and enjoyed it, before walking around to the very back of the house. There was a small extension, just large, protruding glass windows that let in lots of light in the morning when the sun rose. It would be a beautiful sunroom with plants, and a gorgeous junction room between the library, ballroom and outside entertainment area in the future.

They'd already had new windows over the whole house and had it repointed the last time it was renovated a year ago, but there had been even more updates since then. The back roof was lined with solar panels, for instance, and the outside now had a massive entertainment patio laid out with a gazebo, outside furniture and firepit. Further away, next to the natural spring pond four wide tiers up near the treeline – which had been chopped back into a relatively neat curve so it fit more beautifully – there was a pool house so they could change there. There was a bar building for entertaining outside that they could stock with some drinks for the outside, or stock more fully for parties. Around the corner near to the trees, there was a smokehouse Anton had asked for.

They had considered an outdoor pool, but decided it was far too cold most of the year to make it worth it and they'd just get one they could put out on the concrete tiles when it was warm and put away the rest of the year. A children's pool, essentially. Nadia had never been allowed one as a child, because her parents hadn't been keen on ruining their grass with it, so she was excited to get one now.

"We're still waiting on the swing set for over there," Nadia said, pointing to one area by a standalone tree in the garden. "But they have put in the log swing on the big oak."

"I like the little bench under that tree, that'll be nice to sit at," Lenka smiled.

"Yeah, I think we'll get some good pictures over there. It's coming together really fast now," she agreed. "Let's have a look inside."

She got her large set of keys and went through the new kitchen door. The new kitchen had been a point of minor controversy. At first, they weren't going to change it at all as Valkyrie had had a nice new kitchen installed right before they had reunited, and none of them wanted to be wasteful by destroying it. But then with the remodelling ideas from the professional designers, they agreed to widen the room – not to make it any longer, but to deepen it into the house so it had less of the oversized galley kitchen feel to it and make it more open. They were going to just push the back cabinets backwards with the wall, without ruining anything.

Big windows had been installed and the left wall had been removed to open the room into an informal dining area that had more big windows and would one day have a long table in the centre for them all to eat at together. But even that plan had changed slightly. Nadia and Erskine had been worn down to the point they agreed they didn't like how the kitchen felt when it was larger with their original – or before the second reno, anyway – kitchen cabinets, and before they knew it, they'd convinced Anton to let them sell the kitchen cabinets and counter to someone online who took it the next day, and they'd had a whole new kitchen installed.

Now, it was white marble counters – or something that looked like marble but was far hardier, as the maintenance needed for marble was more than any of them were prepared to deal with – with dark sage green bottom cabinets and lighter sage top cabinets. The backsplash was hexagon marble-style tiles that went from the counter to the bottom of the top cabinets, there was a massive oven in the centre of the back wall with a large six ring, electric hob on top, plus extractor above and spaghetti tap. The very tops of the cabinets had a secondary cabinet above them that had glass panelled doors so they could display things, and they had a long new island. There were two kitchen sinks, and a five foot wide fridge next to a five foot wide freezer. And over to the right of the room, not far from one of the entrances in, which came from a hall leading from the orangery for the staff should they ever have a party, was a door going into the new pantry. They were a family of currently nine, with Elder Deuce to likely join them when he wasn't working so hard in the future, and all their friends constantly visiting, and potentially Fletcher if he chose to stay in the future. They needed a lot of food space. And Nadia was already in contact with a professional organiser to make sure the whole kitchen and pantry were perfectly prepped for their move in.

"It's so bright!" Tanith exclaimed.

"Yeah, we have a lot more window space now," Nadia nodded. "And more white. And I think there's twenty-two can lights in here alone."

"That's a lot of lights," Lenka said softly, looking around appreciatively. "You're going to be able to fit so much food in here!"

Nadia couldn't help but laugh a little. "Yeah, it'll be good! The carpenters working on the library are going to be making some custom bits for us like the table later. They already finished the kitchen, as you see. I want to see if they're done with the staircases."

Together, they went through the house and found the almost finished rooms to admire. Some of it was still very much not done, but they could look at a lot of little bits that were finished. Most of the electricals were finished entirely, though not all of the bulbs were in, nor all of the switches and sockets installed. The main staircase was not finished at all, but one of the back staircases was finished so Nadia took them upstairs and they looked around their rooms. It was still hard for her to envision fully. Some rooms looked gigantic for what they were going to be, but others felt too small without furniture and she didn't know how they'd fit it all.

"You've done a really good job planning," Tanith complimented as they looked around her mostly finished apartment. All the upstairs doors were missing and only half the plumbing was done. They were waiting on a lot of appliances. She'd been told there was a working toilet downstairs all the workers were using though, so at least there was that. "The baby's room is massive!"

"It'll be something she can grow into," Nadia agreed. "And I figured once she's not sleeping in your apartment or Ghastly's, you can turn it into whatever space you want."

"You could hang all your Yeti furs," Lenka grinned.

Tanith grinned wickedly. "Fuck yes."

"What happened to no swearing around the kid?" Nadia teased.

Tanith put her hands over Laila's ears. "She'll never know."

While the house was exciting in many ways, it wasn't home yet and there was only so much looking they could do, so they left to get some early lunch together. They found a nice little café not far from the house on Tanith's phone, which Lenka was loving using and seemed to be in a constant state of about-to-pull-it-apart-for-science, and they drove over. It was on a small farm, with their own ice creams, most of the food grown by them, and a small play park next to the parking. They were seated and Nadia instantly looked over the menu.

"I've been craving an egg mayo sandwich," Nadia muttered, looking at the lunch items. "But there's a soup."

"I think it's broccoli," Aine told her.

"I love broccoli."

"That's a strange thing to love. I've never known anyone to not just tolerate it."

"Well. As long as it isn't over-boiled," she shrugged. "Over-boiled broccoli is what they serve in hell. What are you thinking of having?"

"Probably a panini."

"Mm, that'll leave room for ice cream after," she smiled, turning to look at the front of the shop. Only gossiping older mortals were currently there. "Oh, wow, the cakes are massive!"

"I'm not sure they're quite diet friendly," Aine said as drily as she could. There was a deep regret in her voice that spoke volumes of how much she'd love to break her diet. "Maybe next time."

"I'll let you have some of mine," Nadia said kindly. "If it's not your cake, it's not your calories, right?"

Aine cracked a smile. "Maybe I'll try it."

Laila squealed loudly from Tanith's arms, gaining them some looks of annoyance and joy from the elderly people sitting around them. They all ordered and enjoyed light conversation, staying clear of any difficult conversation. As they ordered and waited for their food, it was easy for Nadia to keep up conversation and smile, but as their food was placed and they began to eat, she could feel herself flagging. Militsa and Aine were in conversation about mortal and sorcerer universities while Lenka and Tanith were chatting as if they are on some private date while Laila happily tried to eat every bit of food she could get her hands on. It left her with her thoughts.

She almost got through the entirety of lunch pretending to be incredibly interested in her food to stay out of conversation and got herself a homemade ice cream waffle cone with one cream and one cherry scoop. The ice cream did lift her spirits before Militsa spoke up.

"Nadia, I was hoping to go and see Erembour this afternoon. Would you mind coming with me? I'm not confident I could get to the hospital myself."

"Oh sure, I'd be happy to go with you! We can get some flowers for her on the way if you like," she replied instantly, plastering a smile on.

"That would be nice," Militsa agreed.

They split from Aine, who was going to a lesson with her tutor, and Lenka, Tanith and Laila who were going back to Corrival's together, and took a taxi over to Doctor Synecdoche's practice. Nadia was saved from talking again by the driver who talked both their ears off, and then Doctor Synecdoche's nurse only allowed one person into the room to see Erembour, who was now awake but in pain. Nadia waited in the front entrance for her, texting her friends.

When Militsa was back, she was smiling sadly.

"Is she alright?" Nadia asked.

"I think so," Militsa nodded. "Do you mind if we go straight back to Elder Corrival's house?"

"Sure. I'll call a taxi."

Nadia did that while Militsa went to the bathroom for a moment to calm down her nerves. She was gone right up until their new taxi pulled up, and they got in. This driver was perfectly silent from the moment they got in, using the offered address Nadia had put into the app so they didn't have to interact at all.

Nadia was suddenly overwhelmed with how incredibly awkward it was. She and Militsa hadn't had to be alone. Or, at least, they have been alone but they had had immediate topics of discussion then. Such as Militsa having just been kidnapped and liberated, and then they were talking about rooms and renovations. But now they had exhausted most of their conversations. And were sitting in a car together.

"Militsa," Nadia started suddenly. "I never asked, do you need any help contacting your family?"

"Oh no, er, my family died a while ago," she nodded.

Nadia took a small breath and nodded back. "Right. Um, is there any friends I could help you talk to?"

"Um, not really. I don't have any."

"Oh," Nadia said, looking down at her lap. She wasn't sure if her face was getting flushed or pale from the embarrassment. "Well, you always have me and Valkyrie now."

Militsa smiled. "You're sweet. Me and Valkyrie spoke some in Australia and that was nice. It would be fun to go out and get tea every once and a while. Though with the state of the world right now…"

"Yeah," Nadia finished. "When it's better."

"Sure! Although, hopefully I'll be in teacher training by then. I'd like to do that."

"That'll be good. And you'll meet lots of people that way and make a lot more friends."

"Yeah. I'm looking forward to that aspect of it. University should be a good thing for me. I'm not sure where I'm going yet though."

"Oh, I'll help you have a look when we get back. I don't have all of my perspective guides anymore, but I can get my friends to send pictures of the course information you're interested in."

"That would be really nice," Militsa smiled happily. "Have you thought about going?"

"Hmm, I used to. But I've changed what my, er, hobby is now," she said, once again refraining from mentioning magic. Militsa seemed to understand and nodded. "So I think I'd do a different course from what I used to want to do. I'm still interested in business and my whole family is full of different entrepreneurs and company owners, so I've always sort of thought I'd go that way, but maybe not. Then again, Valkyrie wants me to think about looking at running her family businesses later in life."

"That would be a good job," Militsa commented.

"It would. And it would be nice to help out. But it feels a bit like nepotism."

"Yeah, but as long as you work hard and have someone to answer to so you have goals and stuff, it's not so bad, right? For you at least."

"I mean, I understand what you're saying, but I still feel weird about it."

"I suppose that's fair," Militsa agreed. They pulled onto a main road and sped up. "Have you found a dress for your wedding? I asked Valkyrie about the wedding stuff, but it feels like you probably have more of a hand in it."

"Oh yeah, Valkyrie's fairly romantic and sweet, but she's not into the organising them part. I've looked at some dresses online and some venues, but nothing too serious. It's sort of hard when I don't really know how long it'll be until it can happen."

"I get that."

"I think I have a few ideas of what I don't want though. I don't want to wear a suit, I don't want a vail over my face, I don't want to do it until my parents accept my relationship with Valkyrie. That type of stuff."

"Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't realise your parents weren't accepting," Militsa said, suddenly sad for her.

Nadia took a moment to catch up mentally before her eyes widened. "Oh no, that's not what I meant! They're accepting of us being you know," an eye flick to the driver, "but they don't like Valkyrie as a person so they don't accept our relationship."

"Valkyrie mentioned something like that when I met her."

She sighed softly. "Yeah. I imagine she did. The whole thing was such a mistake. I'm… well, I'm glad she had you at that point. I mean, not like, romantically. Not to say I'm blaming her or anything! I saw someone too! But I'm glad she had someone to talk to. About… things."

"Hey, it's okay. She was a sweetheart, and if I'm honest, we mostly talked about our schooling and you."

"You did?"

"Oh yes. She said from the start she was still, at the time, trying to get over you and had feelings for you, but I still held out hope I suppose. Not intentionally, she's just a great person so it happened naturally. I won't lie, it hurt a little at the time since I had a few self-esteem issues, but I've gotten over my feelings now. I just want to have some friends and enjoy the time we have together. I'm happy to help look over wedding plans with you for fun too."

Nadia smiled warmly. "I'd really like that."

*terminator voice* Depression is imminent, Nadia. Prepare yourselves.

I don't know why that has to be in the Terminators voice but there you go.

Remus Crux: Your brain rot is allowed and I offer no comment on what I have done to Kitana. I don't give out spoilers like that. (ps just wait until your up to date on the RWBY so you can get into the gay fanfics ;) )