Chương 5: 03-1: New Clothes, Work, and Obligations

I woke to Jessi's voice—lazy, warm, threaded through with unmistakable amusement. My consciousness was still clawing its way out of sleep when I felt it. Something was very wrong. Heat. Not just warmth, but a soft, weighted pressure pressed firmly against my chest—impossible to ignore. I lay there for two blank seconds before memory caught up with last night. I'd fallen asleep rigid as a board, turned toward the wall, clinging desperately to the last shreds of my dignity and maintaining careful distance. And yet.

Jessi and I were tangled together in what could only be described as a complete deadlock. Her back was fitted against my chest like she'd always belonged there. At some point during the night—without my knowledge or permission—my arm had wrapped around her waist. My palm rested against warmth that was soft and wild all at once, separated only by the thinnest layer of cloth. Worse: my legs were completely entangled with hers. Her bare, ice-cold skin against mine.

The already-pitifully-narrow space beneath the hide had become a prison of heat and shame.

"Little lordling..." Jessi turned her head slightly. Her voice carried that slow, sleepy smile I could hear before seeing. Her hair brushed across my nose, carrying the cold-clean scent of last night's rain and underneath it, the faint trace of soapwort.

"If you don't get up soon, I'm going to get burned by your branding iron." If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. I froze. Then it felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer directly to my skull.... Branding iron? I looked down and instantly understood exactly what she meant.

"I—you—this—!" Heat exploded from my tailbone straight to the tips of my ears. I scrambled off the bed with all the grace of a man who'd just grabbed live coals—hands, feet, everything moving at once. My foot caught on last night's discarded armor and I stumbled hard, lurching two steps before barely managing to stay upright. The instigator showed absolutely zero remorse. Jessi curled around the hide on that pathetically narrow bed, laughing so hard she was nearly rolling.

Her voice rang out bright and unrestrained, like she was personally settling accounts with the universe. Every shift of the hide flashed glimpses of pale skin, and she couldn't have cared less—if anything, she seemed to be enjoying my suffering specifically.

"Not a word about this to anyone!" I snarled through clenched teeth while wrestling back into my armor, fingers shaking so badly I kept missing the buckles. Which only made me look more ridiculous. Jessi propped her chin on one hand, watching me with radiant, infuriating delight.

"I wonder what the late Margrave Rosa would think," she mused with great solemnity. A deliberate pause.

"His exiled son, finally demonstrating extraordinary magical talent. One more inch, and he might have planted a seed of hope in a young woman's belly with his glowing branding iron."

"JESSI!" The roar came out low and vicious. Even the sword hanging from the bedpost seemed to tremble in sympathy. Was this woman a demon? No—if she were a demon, she'd have to be some high-ranking specialist variety, assigned exclusively to the psychological torment of innocent men. Jessi laughed a little longer before finally, mercifully, reining it in. She dragged her ragged cloak over her shoulders, and for once her expression shifted into something that wasn't immediately infuriating.

"Alright, alright, little lordling." She yawned, her tone losing most of its malicious edge.

"You clung to those rules of yours all night like they were the only thing keeping you alive. Exhausting to watch, honestly. Besides, I didn't lose anything—I was warm. Like sleeping next to the most expensive barrel in the capital's wine cellar."

"There are several problems with that metaphor..." I pressed my fingers to my temple. She just shrugged—the universal gesture of warm enough, nothing else matters. Honestly, that was the most terrifying part. For me, this was a catastrophic humiliation I'd carry to my grave. For her, it barely registered above last night was warm. The gap between those reactions was genuinely distressing.