“Mariella, are you dressed?” Tybalt’s voice carried from behind some stones that separated the area of the water where Mariella had bathed from direct view. “The sun is going to set any minute.”

  Right, I guess he probably needs some light to bathe by, she thought. She had spent a significant chunk of her time washing her clothing, including scrubbing stains out of her gambeson and drying it with her powers. She couldn’t really do laundry without light.

  “Um, mostly!” she called back. She was wearing her underclothes and her gambeson, and everything was more or less dry. She just needed to grab her pants and pull them on, then her footwear, and she would be good to go.

  Tybalt stepped out from around the corner.

  Well, I suppose I said I was mostly decent… He had behaved well in not trying to sneak any peeks until then, so she didn’t take offense to him suddenly stepping closer.

  He saw her, then averted his eyes. Even with her gambeson covering up everything important, he would have caught immediately that he could see up almost the entire length of her legs to where the long shirt barely blocked her underwear from view.

  She felt a little tingle of excitement at the sudden tension in the air.

  Carefully looking away from her, he said, “I’m going to take my bath now, all right?”

  She nodded, then realized he would, of course, not see that.

  “Go ahead!”

  Tybalt stripped off his gambeson carefully, one button at a time, strenuously giving off the appearance of being focused on his task. He continued deliberately not looking in her direction, which Mariella only knew because she kept sneaking glances at him while trying to pretend she was looking in the direction of the water. It felt slightly absurd.

  I saw him without his shirt just yesterday. What changed?

  But Tybalt had been covered in black and blue at the time that she treated his injuries, with broken ribs, cuts, and more bruises than she could count. She had tried to remain focused on patching him up. Even then, there had been a tension in her at being so close to him. Now he was more or less fully healed, looking healthy and strong, slim but muscular—and she was noticing far too much about his body.

  A second after he got his gambeson off, he shucked off both boots. Then he removed his belt, and his pants practically fell away with a single tug. There was a flash of pale skin past her line of sight, and then a single loud splash announced he had made it into the water.

  That was so quick… I didn’t see anything!

  It took a moment for Mariella to be embarrassed at the way that had sounded in her head. Like she was disappointed.

  Time to go. She felt suddenly self-conscious.

  She rose and picked up her pants from a rock beside her, only to stop at the sound of Tybalt’s voice.

  “Why don’t you stay here and talk to me?” he said. “I don’t think you can really see anything with the dying light and the water in the way, and I kind of need you to dry my clothes off after I wash them anyway.”

  She realized he was right. She had washed her own clothing by hand, then dried it with her powers, but Tybalt’s bone magic wasn’t exactly suited to that task. She sat back down, and without being fully consciously aware of it, she dropped her pants in the same spot they had been before.

  “The water is really nice,” he added. “Did you use your powers to warm it up?”

  “Yeah,” she said, smiling. “I’m glad you like it.”

  She could see he was casually swimming back and forth, using short casual strokes because he wasn’t trying to get anywhere, just enjoying himself.

  “I’m grateful,” he said. “This water is probably snowmelt from near the top of the mountain. If you didn’t warm it up, it would be freezing.”

  “It was,” she confirmed. The chill of it had sent a shock of goosebumps rolling across her flesh as soon as she eased herself into the water, before she channeled her magic to heat it.

  “I guess you should stay close, in case I need it heated up again,” Tybalt said.

  “I’m not here to—” Mariella interrupted her own sentence with a laugh. She saw he was smiling too.

  All right, I get it!

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  “Any excuse to keep me close will do?” she asked in a teasing voice.

  “Correct. And I’m not halfway through my excuses. You might as well get comfortable. Dip your toes in the water.”

  “All the better to keep it warm,” she said with a hint of sarcasm. But she sat back down and submerged her feet in the pool. “You know, you’re lucky I feel like humoring you.”

  “That is a happy coincidence.”

  “The truth is—” she hesitated for a moment—“I have the most absurd feeling that I wouldn’t have survived this trip to the Salt Waste if you hadn’t been here.”

  “You’re right,” Tybalt said. She was about to ask him what he meant, when he continued, “That is absurd.”

  “I guess it’s just that we’ve been through a lot together in a short amount of time,” she said. “Maybe I could have survived alone. I probably would have still been under a lot of… illusions about the work we were doing out here. That might have protected me.”

  “Or the beastfolk would take their revenge on you, just like they’re trying to do with the rest of the squad.”

  She nodded and let the matter drop. She didn’t need to say anything more. They both knew what had happened already. The beastfolk might very well still want to kill the two of them, even if Mariella and Tybalt negotiated with them and promised to help them drive off the Army.

  “I hope you enjoyed your bath,” he said after a moment.

  “I feel civilized again, if that answers your question.”

  “I think so.”

  “What were you up to while you were waiting?”

  “Looking at my level ten skill options.”

  “Oh, what did you get?”

  “There was a skill based on what we’ve been practicing. The system named it Bonebreaker.”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Another one called Mystic Blast.”

  “That’s a very common one for mages of whatever kind. You’ll probably be able to learn it on your own. It’s just turning your mana into a projectile weapon, basically. Anything else?”

  Tybalt is too talented to take Mystic Blast. I’m sure I could help him figure it out. Bonebreaker, he’s already halfway got, from the way that last attack during our sparring session felt. He might as well save the skill selection for level fifteen, if the other options are like those two…

  Tybalt paused, and Mariella wondered if there had only been two skills on offer. That seemed unlikely. Some rare classes only ever got a handful of skills, or even a single skill, supposedly. But even for a unique class, as for more common classes like fire mage, the typical pattern was that the number of options at the second tier was greater than the two in the first tier. At least three, maybe four or five choices.

  The pause lasted a few seconds too long.

  Oh. I see. You have other options. You just… don’t trust me with them.

  “Fine, keep your secrets,” she said, trying and failing to say the words lightly. It was hard not to be a little annoyed. After all they had been through together, he didn’t quite trust her. Despite the two of them having saved each other’s lives. “I know you like those.”

  There was whatever he and Baldwin had been up to when they were scouting. There was the beating from the squad that she’d had to pressure him into talking about—although she at least understood the reason behind that. There was the class he had kept secret from everyone until she confronted him about it. What was this barrier inside of Tybalt that kept him from trusting other people? Even her…

  I thought we were past this.

  “Mariella…”

  “It’s really all right,” she said. She grew more annoyed at her failure to sound convincing even to herself. “I just thought this was something that… we were doing together. I’d happily tell you all my skills.”

  She realized as the words left her mouth that they were completely true. It was making oneself a bit vulnerable to reveal that kind of information. But she would trust him with a list of all her skills in a heartbeat. She felt a little pang in her chest and swallowed a lump in her throat.

  I’m just an idiot. Despite what he said, and despite what I said, I’m more invested in… whatever this is… than he is. I guess it makes sense. I’ve never been with… I’ve never had someone in my life like him before. Having an affair with some woman he barely knows… for him, it’s probably just another normal thing.

  She hated how much that thought bothered her. That she was a casual pursuit for him.

  “It’s not like that,” he said. “The other skill choices were just… embarrassing. Really pathetic.”

  She waited for him to say what the embarrassing skill options were. Maybe he was telling the truth.

  The silence resumed.

  She started to rise and reached for her pants again.

  “Mariella, wait,” Tybalt said. “At least give me the soap. You promised me that.”

  A little part of her wanted to laugh. He was funny, at least. She would have expected some more excuses, and instead, she got a line that he probably thought would break this unpleasant feeling building in the air. It almost worked.

  But she listened to the louder, frustrated part of herself. She bent to grab the soap she had placed a foot from the water’s edge. Every little movement was annoyed, sharp, unnecessarily violent. She was conscious that the gambeson pulled slightly higher up on her back as she bent, possibly revealing her underwear. In her irritated state, she didn’t even care. Maybe Tybalt would feel a little of the frustration she was experiencing, looking but being unable to touch.

  She gripped the soap hard. She was thinking of chucking it at his head. Either that, or at least into the water. Let him try and find it himself.

  While she was still crouched, about to get back up and turn to face him, trying to think of some other words to tell him off with, she felt a pair of hands on her ankles. Her eyes widened.

  He wouldn’t.

  Before Mariella had a chance to stand up straight, get her balance, or pull her ankles away, there was a sudden yank, and she found herself underwater.

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