WHISPERS BETWEEN ENEMIE
Night had deepened across the ruined manor, shadows stretching into corners untouched by firelight. Rain pattered on the scorched rooftop in quiet rhythm. Lady Seraphina Vale sat beside the hearth, staring into the flames as if they held answers to questions she could not speak aloud. The scent of rain and ash mingled in the air.
Commander Alaric Thorne's presence lingered even in absence. The heat of his gaze. The weight of his voice. The maddening contradiction of everything he was: conqueror and savior, enemy and—worse—something more.
She had let him stay. Not from fear. Not from coercion. From curiosity... and something that felt far more dangerous.
The door creaked open.
Alaric stepped inside, no longer in armor, dressed in a dark tunic, his eyes shadowed and unreadable. Rain glistened on his shoulders. He looked like a man who carried storms inside him.
"You should be resting," Seraphina said, her voice barely above the fire's crackle.
"I couldn't," he replied, stepping closer. "I didn't want to leave the night unfinished."
She watched him, cautious. "Unfinished?"
"There are truths I carry better in silence. But you... you make the silence loud."
Something in his voice broke past her defenses. She stood, facing him, inches apart. Rain drummed faster on the windowpanes.
"We are supposed to hate each other," she whispered.
"I've spent a lifetime learning how to hate. I no longer trust what I've been taught."
He raised a hand, not quite touching her face. "May I?"
She didn't answer with words.
Their lips met in the hush of the ruined manor. It was not a kiss of victory or surrender—it was a moment stolen from time, full of longing, grief, and reckless hope. She tasted war on his lips and felt home in the hand that cradled her cheek.
When they parted, breathless, the silence between them said more than vows ever could.
"Stay," she said. "Just for tonight."
He nodded. They sat by the fire, close enough to feel each other's warmth. No titles. No commands. Just Seraphina and Alaric.
Sleep found them slowly, hand in hand, the fire dimming to embers.
---
Morning brought no sun—only a gray fog that curled through the ruins like a memory.
Alaric woke first, his cloak wrapped around her sleeping form. The sight of her like that—unguarded, at peace—cut deeper than any blade. He didn't want to move. Didn't want to face the world that would tear this fragile thing apart.
He stood and walked to the window. The mist outside swirled like ghostly dancers in mourning. Valemere was quiet, but not peaceful. Tension hung in the silence.
Seraphina stirred beside the hearth, her eyes opening slowly. She blinked as if to remember where she was, and who she had let close.
"I dreamt we were children," she murmured. "Before the war. Before all of this."
"Would we have been friends?" he asked.
She considered it. "Perhaps. You might have picked flowers from my garden. I'd have stolen your sword to pretend I was a knight."
He smiled faintly. "And you would've been better than most."
Their shared laughter was soft, fleeting. It reminded them of what the world denied them: simplicity.
A knock shattered the illusion.
Captain Brennor entered. "Commander. Riders approach—bearing House Eleryn's banner."
Seraphina stiffened. Her house.
Alaric's jaw tightened. "How many?"
"Twenty riders, heavily armed. They request the release of Lady Vale."
The silence between the three was palpable.
"You're free to go," Alaric said quietly.
Seraphina rose slowly. "No conditions?"
"No chains," he said. "Only the memory of last night."
She hesitated, then walked to him. "Why are you doing this?"
"Because if I kept you, the world would burn. And I'd let it."
Her breath caught. She lifted a hand to his chest, feeling the thunder of his heart.
"Then let this be unfinished," she said. "Let it wait until peace comes."
"If peace ever comes."
She stepped away, and he felt the world tilt.
Before she reached the door, she turned. "Promise me something."
"Anything."
"If war forces us to meet again—on opposite sides—don't kill me before I remind you of this night."
He swallowed hard. "You have my word."
And then she was gone.
The fog swallowed her, and Alaric stood unmoving, as if carved from the very stone of the manor.
Later, when Brennor returned, he found Alaric still by the window.
"Orders, Commander?"
"None," Alaric said. "Not today."
And beneath his breath, too soft for anyone but the ghosts of Valemere to hear, he whispered, "Let me remember what it feels like to be human
The road from Valemere to Eleryn's seat in the East was long, winding through burned villages and empty watchtowers. Seraphina rode at the center of her father's men, her face veiled, her heart exposed beneath the steel of her composure. No one dared ask what had happened inside the manor. None spoke of the fire or the storm that followed it.
But in her hand, pressed close to her chest beneath her cloak, was a folded parchment. Ink barely dry. A letter not written by Alaric, but meant for him.
She would send it when it was safe. If it was ever safe.
Back in Thornehold, Alaric sat in his war room, surrounded by the grinding voices of command. Maps were spread across the table like battlefields already scarred. Lords and spies brought word of shifting allegiances, of whispers in courts, and of southern nobles questioning his hesitation to strike deeper into Eleryn territory.
"You've gone soft," one accused.
"Not soft," Alaric growled. "Strategic."
But even he could feel the fraying edge of his resolve. He had built his life on discipline, on clarity. Seraphina had torn it all apart with a single kiss.
That night, when the war room had emptied, he found a missive sealed in plain wax waiting on his desk. There was no mark. No name. Only the faintest scent of wild roses.
His hands trembled as he broke the seal.
> Alaric,
I rode away without looking back, but I left something behind. Not my heart—that would be too poetic, too unwise—but a version of myself that existed only in the light of your fire. I write to you not as a Lady of Eleryn, nor as a pawn in this endless game, but as the woman who lay beside you, unguarded, and felt something dangerous.
I do not ask you to change your path. Only to remember that not all enemies wear banners. Some wear longing. Some wear hope.
I will see you again. That is both promise and threat.
Alaric sat in the silence after, eyes closed, letter trembling in his hands.
He knew now that the next time they met, it would be under the eye of kings and queens, with blades drawn and courtiers watching. The price of their affection would not be secrecy. It would be blood.
And yet, he hoped.
He folded the letter and tucked it into his breastplate.
Let the world burn, he thought, as long as she remembered him when it did
The hall of House Eleryn was gilded in tapestries, but the warmth in its stone walls was a lie. Seraphina stood before her father's council, head held high, her armor exchanged for courtly velvet, though the stiffness in her spine betrayed no softness.
Lord Edmund Vale, tall and severe, sat at the head of the table, his fingers drumming a slow warning against the oak. Beside him sat High Chancellor Morvin, whose hawk-like gaze flicked to her every time a word passed her lips.
"You're certain Commander Thorne made no demands?" her father asked.
"None," she said evenly. "He spared me, and gave me safe passage."
"Strange," Morvin muttered. "Too strange."
"You think me a traitor?" she challenged.
"I think Thorne is too clever by half," Morvin said, "and you too proud to admit what might've passed between you and your captor."
Seraphina's hands tightened in her skirts. "I gave him nothing. But perhaps he realized blood cannot win hearts—or peace."
The council erupted in whispers. One voice accused; another defended. It was Lord Rurik, a cousin of her late mother's line, who said, "Perhaps we should look at this not as weakness, but as opportunity."
"Explain," said Edmund.
"If there is a thread between Lady Seraphina and the Wolf of Thornehold, perhaps it can be used. Woven into diplomacy. A truce."
Edmund's eyes flashed. "No daughter of mine will become a peace token."
"I am no one's token," Seraphina snapped. "And if you truly believe war is our only answer, then it will consume us all."
The chamber fell silent.
Later, alone in her chambers, Seraphina stood by her window, fingers grazing the velvet curtain. Outside, the gardens she had once played in as a child were barren from frost. The wind smelled of fire and fear.
A knock broke her reverie. It was Talia, her handmaid.
"My lady," she whispered. "A message arrived by raven. No crest."
Seraphina took the small scroll and dismissed her. The parchment was rough, the writing sharp and purposeful.
> The stars were dull last night without your fire beside me.
Tell me the truth—are you safe? Are they treating you as you deserve?
If not, say one word. I'll come through fire again.
Her hands trembled.
She burned the letter in her hearth, but not before copying it in her mind. In a hidden compartment behind a panel in her desk, she placed her reply:
> They fear me now, for I have been touched by the enemy and remain unburned. But I carry your fire still.
I am watched. Speak to me only through shadows.
—
---
Back in Thornehold, Alaric received her reply through a merchant loyal to no crown. He read it beneath the moonlight, where no ears could overhear his breath hitch.
"Captain," he called to Brennor, who stood nearby.
"Yes, Commander?"
"I want eyes in Eleryn's court. And I want them yesterday."
"As you wish. May I ask—"
"No. Don't ask."
Alaric looked toward the horizon. Toward a place his heart now wandered freely, even as war tightened its grip around them both.
And in the dark, the wind carried whispers neither crown nor sword could silence