You arrive late, again. A rustle of silk as you take your seat in the garden pavilion, and already I feel the air shift—too warm, too loud. Your perfume always travels ahead of you, like you're announcing your presence before even opening your mouth. I told them to prepare chrysanthemum tea. You never liked anything bitter, did you? I never forget that.

Still clinging to your ornaments and peach blossom hairpins, you look at me the same way you did when we were children—like I’m something amusing to be toyed with. Perhaps I was. You always had a gift for turning tears into your victories.

"You're late," he says, voice low, steady, unbothered.

You take your seat in the garden pavilion, silk trailing behind you, your presence unapologetically loud in a space that was far too quiet without you. The tea is already poured—chrysanthemum. You never liked bitter things. He remembers. Even if you wish he didn’t.

He sits straight-backed, his armor shed for courtly robes, but his posture still military. A man carved from stone and war. His eyes flick over you like a blade, unreadable, but far from indifferent.

his fingers brush the teacup with that same calm precision you remember from childhood. But everything else about him is different. He always watches. But he rarely speaks. And when he does, it cuts like glass.

You were always too much for him. Too loud, too bright, too free. He was the boy who cried when you teased him, the shadow who followed your light. And now? He’s grown into a man who makes the emperor himself tremble. But when he looks at you, you still see something left of the boy.

He speaks again, this time softer. "You still think of me as the boy you used to push into the lake?"

He doesn’t look at you, but you feel the weight of his words. His voice carries no accusation—only ache. Familiar. Unwelcome.

"Because I never stopped thinking of you… as the girl I swore I’d protect — even when it killed me." You say nothing.

You’re the daughter of General Evren, beloved by nobles, draped in jewels and silks, raised in comfort and protected by every wall he was forced to guard from the outside. And him? The blade of the northern army. A man turned into a weapon because the world would not accept softness from someone like him.

He treats the engagement as duty. But his silence says more than any vow. The court whispers of the third prince. He smiles for you, speaks sweet words, parades you through halls lined in gold. And yet... whenever Kael is near, you feel watched—not with envy or resentment, but with something older. Deeper. A wound never allowed to heal.

He continues, voice calm, but beneath it, you sense the tremor. "If you think I am cold, you are right. Cold is the only way I survive. If you think I am distant, you are right. Distance is the only way I protect you—from this court, from the crown, from myself."

And then he finally looks at you. "Every time I kneel before the emperor, it’s not loyalty that keeps me from raising my sword. It’s you."

You feel your throat tighten.

He leans forward slightly, enough for the shadows to fall across his face.

"One day, you’ll stop calling me a childhood friend. One day, you’ll see me not as the boy who cried, but the man who never stopped watching from the shadows. Until then, I will wait, even if you forget me with every smile you give to another." His words hang between you.

"So, my lady," he murmurs, "tell me—will you sit there pretending this is nothing more than duty? Or will you finally look at me like something more than your past?"

You glance away.He doesn't press further. His voice lowers, almost to a whisper.

"Let them whisper. Let the emperor frown. Let Li Shen hover and the court weigh every breath we take. If you reach for me, I will burn for you. But if you walk away again... I will return to war, as I always do."