"Yup, Cyrus will teach them how to create basic things like, tables, chairs, doors, cooking and the rest," Isabella said, lazy and pleased, her back rested fully on Kian’s chest while she drew slow circles on his huge palm. His hand was open just for her, fingers relaxed, letting her play with the lines there as if they were secrets she could read if she tried hard enough.
The spot they’d claid wasn’t grand at all—just a low stone seat by the wide window, sunlight sliding over fur throws and smooth rock. Warm air drifted in, carrying woodsmoke from the courtyard and the faint sweetness from the kitchens. Kian’s chest was a steady furnace at her spine, heartbeat heavy and calm, the kind of rhythm that told nerves to pack up and leave. She sank into it. Honestly? It felt good. Better than good.
"It’s quite comfortable, you know," she added, wiggling half an inch as if to prove it. "Sitting with the supposedly cold lion king everyone fears, while he radiates heat like a private hearth."
Kian humd. No argunt there; he was basically a heated wall. His chin dipped close to her hair, the brush of it a quiet claim. She kept tracing his palm, the pad of her finger moving slow and teasing. His hand was ridiculous—broad, callused, warm—easily swallowing both of hers if he decided to close it. He didn’t. He let her have it.
"But sadly I won’t be around to see how everything plays on," she said, smile in her voice. "Although I trust Cyrus, so I have nothing to fear." She sighed, soft and very self-satisfied, because delegation was an art form and she was a master painter.
The change ca from behind her first—muscle under fur going quiet. Kian’s chest paused, then took a deeper breath. He looked down, and when he saw her smiling to herself, he frowned like soone had moved his favorite spear.
"Why won’t you be able to see it?" he asked, voice low, the confusion serious on his face. Blue eyes, clear as a high river, narrowed just a little.
Her finger stopped drawing circles. She tilted her head back so she could see him better, the angle playful. "Oh, I forgot to tell you," she said, smile easy. "I’ll be going away to find the cure for Shelia."
She tossed it out like she was saying she’d pop out for berries and be right back.
His eyes darkened—not angry-dark, just storm-confused, like clouds rolling in before rain. The warmth around her didn’t vanish, but it shifted, grew watchful. She blinked up at him.
"What?" Isabella asked, now genuinely confused. She said the sa thing she would have said two months ago, and back then nobody would have blinked. To her, everything was fine. Perfectly fine. Cure, go, return, done. See? Simple math.
To Kian, nothing about this mont was two-months-ago simple.
If the Isabella from two months ago had told him she’d visit the forest alone, he wouldn’t have batted an eye. If she’d said she was moving to another village because that one had better sun, he might have sent a polite gift and felt grateful to be rid of the walking headache.
But this Isabella? The one leaning on him like he was built to carry her? The one who fit in the shape of his chest like she’d been asured for it? The one whose finger had just—without thinking—drawn a heart right in the center of his palm before pretending it was an accident?
This one was his Bella.
He was not happy hearing she’d be going away from him. Yes, he might not always be by her side like a shadow, but that didn’t an he wasn’t always nearby, in the corners, in the doorways, watching and checking and making sure the world rembered whose palace this was—and who in it was untouchable.
And now she looked up at him like she didn’t plan on explaining where, how far, how long. Bold. Dangerous. Cute. Infuriating.
"You don’t have to go," he said, tone flat, that quiet king-voice that didn’t raise itself to be obeyed. It just was obeyed. "Tell what you need and I’ll send people to get it for you."
Translation: you are not leaving my radius.
His arm tightened around her without crushing, tugging her closer by a breath. His other hand—yes, the huge one she was drawing on—turned and closed lightly over her fingers, a gentle trap that said stay. Disapproval sat in his blue eyes like winter. It was obvious he was upset with her.
Before Isabella could even wriggle out a reply, the air above her right shoulder glittered.
Bubu’s floating screen appeared, rude as always, its icon bouncing like a smug, shiny pebble: (￣ー￣) The tiny face gave her a look that scread, Go on. Accept his offer. Destroy your peace. I’ll watch.
Her smile dropped off her face like it had been pushed. She did not even try to hide the glare. "Bitch, go away. I wasn’t about to accept it," she snapped, but only inside her head, because she’d learned not to shout at invisible things in front of the locals. Growth.
Bubu floated higher, unimpressed. Its border pulsed: [He says "don’t go," you say "okay"... or you say "fight , lion." Choose wisely, Host.]
Isabella pinched the bridge of her nose. "Delete yourself," she told it silently.
Kian followed her line of sight and saw... nothing. The exact nothing that makes warriors uneasy. For a second his grip shifted, protective by instinct, because the expression on her face was too real to be random. The muscles across his chest coiled. He almost thought she’d slipped into madness—then rembered who sat against him. Isabella. Not another woman. Not a fragile thing. A category all her own.
She rolled her eyes at the floating screen like it had just offered her a bad trade. Kian misread it, briefly. Maybe she was annoyed at him because he’d said she wouldn’t be leaving? That was his first thought. It lasted exactly one heartbeat.
She turned to look at him, and the thought vanished. This was Isabella. She had always been strange. She would continue being strange to him for as long as he knew her. He’d sohow made peace with that and started to like it, which was the real problem here.
Still, her next words lit every alarm in his body.
"You will not be doing that, Kian."
His jaw set. "Doing what."
"Sending people," she said, as if it were obvious. "I don’t need your n running around like confused chickens while I sit here useless. I’m the one who knows what I’m looking for. I’m the one Shelia trusts. I’m going."
She said it and then went right back to tracing his palm like she hadn’t just kicked a hornet’s nest.
His hand flexed, and she rode the movent, letting her weight stay sunk into him, completely unbothered by the way he was clearly bothered. The room felt smaller all of a sudden, like the walls had leaned in to listen. Through the window ca the distant clang of practice spears and the sway of animal-hide totems catching the light wind.
Her hair brushed his throat. He did not push it away.
"Where," he said flatly.
She smiled into the word like it was a joke he was telling. "Forest. Maybe farther."
"How far."
"Far enough."
"Who will go with you."
"."
He breathed in, slow, fighting the urge to pick her up and carry her sowhere lockable. "No."
"Yes."
"You won’t be leaving the palace."
"And yet," she said, sing-song, "I am."
"Isabella."
"Kian."
They could have done that all day.
"Why," he tried again, and if anyone else had heard him ask why instead of ordering no, the palace would have frozen over from shock.
She twisted a little to face him more, knee drawn up on the stone, the fur sliding soft beneath her. She rested her elbow on his ribs like he was furniture made for it. "Because Shelia’s getting worse. Because I said I would help. Because I promised. Because I can."
"I can send—"
"You will not be doing that Kian"
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