Amanda didn’t even have time to blink.
Randel scooped her up into his arms — effortlessly, as if she weighed no more than a feather — and rose to his full height. His armor was covered in someone else’s blood, his face was cut, and his arm still ached from the recent wound. Yet he was smiling. Smiling the way people smile when they’ve just cheated death and realized it was worth living for.
“What are you…” Amanda began, but the words caught in her throat.
“You said you love me,” he replied, taking the first step down the slope. “Now I have the right.”
“The right? To what?!”
“To carry you away. Like in the old legends. The hero returns from the battlefield and claims his reward.”
Amanda blushed so fiercely that even the tips of her ears burned. She tried to wriggle free, but his arms held her firmly — not painfully, but in a way that made any resistance completely futile.
“Put me down! People are watching!”
“Let them watch,” Randel said, not even glancing at the camp, though he knew hundreds of eyes were fixed on them. “They should know who they owe this victory to. And who I owe my heart to.”
“You’re impossible!”
“You’ve said that before. I like it.”
Amanda finally gave up and buried her face in his neck. Her cheeks were burning, her breath tickled his skin, and she could feel him shiver.
“Stop breathing,” he whispered, his voice dropping lower.
“I can’t. I’m alive.”
“That’s a problem.”
She lifted her head to argue and saw his smile. Not the cold, commanding one. Not the polite, courtly one. A real smile. Warm. Happy.
“You’re trembling,” she noticed.
“It’s your fault.”
“How?!”
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“You’re breathing on my neck. It tickles.”
Amanda froze for a second, then — she didn’t even know why — deliberately breathed out harder, right against his skin.
Randel flinched so hard he nearly tripped over a stone.
“You’re doing that on purpose!”
“No,” she smiled — for the first time all day. “It was an accident.”
“An accident twice in a row?”
“You talk too much.”
“And you do too little.”
She blushed even deeper and hid her face in his neck again.
The camp fell silent. Soldiers who had just finished dispatching the wounded and collecting trophies froze in place, watching their commander descend the hill with a woman in his arms.
The old veteran — the same one who that morning had ordered everyone to keep their distance from the Keeper — slowly nodded. It wasn’t a bow. It wasn’t a command. Just a gesture of understanding.
“He’s claiming what’s his,” he said.
“His?” asked the young soldier beside him.
“Victory. Life. Her. All at once.”
Kaito Tsubame, standing near his tent, watched the scene with an expression that could only be called admiration.
“I thought he was just a dry old soldier,” he said to Ren. “But he… he…”
“He’s alive,” Ren finished for him. “Just like the rest of us today.”
Randel had already passed through the camp. His path led to the command tent — the large, spacious one where they had spent so many nights bent over maps. But this time he wasn’t carrying strategy. He was carrying his happiness.
“Are you sure you can walk?” Amanda asked softly, feeling him stumble slightly now and then.
“I’ve never been more sure of anything.”
“You’re covered in blood.”
“It’s not mine.”
“Should that reassure me?”
“It should. I’m here. I’m alive. I’m carrying you. Everything else is just details.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Your idiot.”
She buried her face in his neck again, feeling her heart hammering somewhere in her throat.
The tent was close. Randel stopped at the entrance, and Amanda felt his arms tighten around her just a little more.
“I’m going to walk in now,” he said. “And I won’t let you go until morning. Are you okay with that?”
She lifted her head. In her eyes — red from nature and from tears — something burned that he had never seen before. Or perhaps he had seen it, but had been afraid to acknowledge.
“And if I say ‘no’?”
“You won’t.”
“Where does all this confidence come from?”
“Because you want this just as much as I do. You’re just scared.”
She wanted to argue. She wanted to say something clever, cynical, defensive. But the words stuck in her throat. Because he was right.
“Come in,” she whispered.
Randel stepped into the tent. The flap fell shut behind them, and the outside world ceased to exist.
The soldiers who had been watching silently dispersed. Some went to bury the fallen. Some went to tend to the wounded. Others simply sat by the fire, staring into the flames and remembering those who would not return home.
“What’s going to happen in there?” a young soldier asked the veteran.
The veteran looked at the tent where the two had just disappeared.
“Nothing, lad,” he said. “Just two people who finally realized today that they’re alive. And that they have someone worth living for.”
He paused, then added with a rough grin:
“And you’re too young for this talk, you snot-nosed brat! Go find your sword on the battlefield instead. You dropped it.”
He turned and walked away toward his men. No one asked any more questions.