RD 5 Ch 28

Simone followed me back to what I could only assume was the master bedroom. It wasn’t so glorious as to have indoor plumbing, but the bed looked inviting. And after the day I’d had, I was more than eager to sink into it and move on to the next day.

That, however, wasn’t in the cards.

Simone cleared her throat. “Well, now that you’re here, Lord Bran…” she said, fluttering her eyelashes at me suggestively and leaving the rest up to my imagination.

I turned back to her, my own thoughts shifting mercurially. “I have an idea of what this is about,” I said, my eyes taking her in.

She was my Simone, my lovely Simone, yet she didn’t remember me. Not everything. While her body and, in a way, her mind still seemed devoted to me, it wasn’t the Simone who remembered our life and trials together. I wanted to be careful of cheapening what we had just because I so desperately wanted my Simone back.

I had been with Circe, but that had been an attempt at quickly finishing this trial and saving all of them, so it felt different. Now, we were in an entirely different position. All I could do was plan to make it up to Circe and Simone later.

“You’re going to reject me, aren’t you?” Simone asked with big puppy-dog eyes. “Is it because of how I treated you?”

“No,” I said quickly. Simone looked like a woman at the end of her rope and I couldn’t let her down. “It’s just that right now you don’t remember me. For example, do you remember the times we went to the Free Players Alliance market and you stole an incredibly expensive potion to save my mother?” I smiled at the memory. It was the start of something incredible.

“No… I guess I don’t.” Simone fidgeted with her hands, glancing down at them and then back up at me. A new determination sparked in her eyes. “But we can make new memories.” Her eyes were eager.

“Of course we will. We’re going to finish this up and then return, at which point your memories should come back.” I brushed her hair back. “I’m sorry. This must feel like a failure of something you were supposed to get. To me it simply feels like taking a break until you return to yourself.” I smiled and kissed her cheek, pulling Simone close.

She nuzzled against my hand without any fear I would let her fall. “I trust you above all else, Bran. But if nothing else, I still wish to be close to you. Even if you won’t accept me in that way, may I at least share the bed with you? I want to be close. I want to see you when I wake up as a reminder that it wasn’t some dream, that better days are yet to come. I have faith that as long as I’m with you, everything will be all right.” She stared up at me with eyes that were impossible to disappoint.

“Fine,” I said, if for no other reason than to get rid of that look on Simone’s face.

It worked. She cracked a massive smile and jumped into my arms, kissing my cheek and neck in a rapid flurry of affection. “I love you, even if I have to wait for things to return as they should be.”

I also had a vague feeling that these kisses and the interest in my bed were Simone marking her territory, or at least making sure the others didn’t make any forward momentum by taking up my bed.

She read me like a book. “If that’s how you feel, why did you spend the night with Circe?”

“Uh… about that.” I shrugged. “I thought the easiest way to accomplish my quest was with… other skills in bed. Only later did I learn it’s more about military command than acts of subservience.” I couldn’t meet Simone’s pouty eyes as she clung to me, looking upset but unwilling to make a scene, especially after I’d just agreed to let her in my bed.

“Fine,” Simone said with a hint of finality. “We’ll be out of here soon anyway, right?”

“As long as the three forces can work together moderately well, we should be able to overcome Princess Almeria’s forces with ease,” I said, glancing toward the setting sun. Soon I’d be out of here and back to our normal lives. If everything went the way I hoped it did, and lets be honest that wasn’t going so well lately.

“But we still have to capture her. Don’t we?” Simone asked.

I waved a hand. “The important part is done. I have you and Circe, and we’ll make it out. Truth be told, I couldn’t stand the thought of losing either of you. I’ll do whatever it takes to make sure the two of you leave with me. The other two are just bonuses.”

Simone searched my face, then a giant grin dawned. “You really, and I mean really, love me, don’t you?” she asked, not waiting for an answer. Perhaps she didn’t need one; instead she spun around and began preparing the bed for two people.

It felt so good to interact with this Simone and not the one who was fighting her interest in me. I hadn’t realized just how much I missed her attention and affection.

***

I woke to Simone curled desperately up against me.

Even though we hadn’t shared any real pleasures the night before, having her pressed to me made everything feel right for the first time since I’d come into the trial. It made this world feel real for a moment.

The sun continued to rise, its rays sliding deeper into the room until they shone across Simone’s face. She grumbled and shoved at the offending light, but that fight was futile, the day had come and wasn’t going anywhere for many hours.

Simone blinked awake and found me watching her. Her face brightened into ecstasy and she wrapped herself around me. “It wasn’t just a wonderful dream,” she murmured, snuggling into me.

“If it is, you have to pinch me and wake me up,” I said, pulling her tighter.

Mischief twinkled in her eyes and she gave me a pinch in the side. “Nope. Not a dream.”

“It’s it normally the other way around? The pinched get to determine if it’s a dream or not.” I huffed playfully.

She shrugged, guilt written across her face but not an ounce of regret.

“We should probably get out of bed,” I said, not wanting to be too stern. “There’s too much to do.”

Simone buried her head in my chest and clung to me. “Five more minutes,” she pleaded, voice muffled. “Then she can share you with me.” Simone hadn’t had a jealous bone in her body before, but the forgetting had changed the situation; it was like a new, possessive edge had crept in. It was strange how much our past experiences shaped our present desires.

I kissed the top of her head. “I’ll give you six. Then we go see the others.”

She beamed and settled in for her six minutes.

***

“Look who finally got out of bed,” Circe said, sipping juice and watching us over the rim of her cup.

“It’s not what you think,” I said. “Besides, don’t say things like that with Winnie around. We don’t want to give her any ideas.” I glanced at the cursed woman.

Winnie seemed calm this morning; her white hair was pinned up in a loose bun, the kind I’d seen on many of her female warriors. The hairdo was practical and kept out of the face without cutting it short. She opened her eyes and a harder light flickered in them. “They don’t smell like sex,” she observed bluntly.

“Well, now that we’ve established that,” Simone cut through the awkwardness and dove straight into business. “What do we do next?”

All eyes shifted to me. Clearly leadership had landed squarely on my shoulders, and the others were ready to poke holes in whatever plan I offered.

“I’d like to take back the Citadel of Blood,” I said. “I’m not sure exactly how it’ll be configured in this instance, but given how it’s positioned as the goal between all four groups, I think it’s worth taking as our post for the combined forces.” I looked at the women, gauging their first impressions.

Winnie sat back, her crossed arms relaxing. “Good. That’s what I was hoping you’d say.”

Circe nodded as she set her juice down. “We should take the advantage while we have it. I’d suggest we rush in now and secure it even before we move the bulk of our forces. The fortress has incredible enchantments baked into it, even with just half my forces I should be able to hold it against the entirety of Princess Almeria.”

My brows shot up as I sat down at the table. “I know I put some good defenses on it outside this instance, but I don’t know how well they’ve carried over.”

Simone turned to me, eager to explain. “Lord Bran,  I mean you, of course,” she stumbled over the correction. “You enchanted the place with a number of powerful wards. However, they’re incredibly expensive to run.”

“Expensive, how?” I asked, feeling an undercurrent of something in her words.

“Blood,” all three women said at once.

“Blood of our enemies,” Simone clarified. “The wards work best when there’s a fight. Outside of that, they’re pretty useless. Spill the blood of your enemies against the walls and they glow like sunrise, becoming impossible to breach.”

I processed that information. It did not match how enchantments worked on the outside. But if this place was basically a king-of-the-hill setup, it made sense to give whoever held the top of the hill an advantage. It gave us a concrete strategy to consider.

“Fine. Then I assume everyone knows how these work?” I asked.

Simone nodded. “Siege tactics usually come next. To defend against a siege, the best choice would be to stock up before heading to the center.”

“No.” I shook my head after a moment of thought. “We aren’t going to try and wear down a siege. Baiting one might be useful, but we should finish this as quickly as possible. Still, the Citadel would be the perfect point to launch our next attack from and a place to merge our forces.”

“If we have the citadel, why push?” Circe scowled. All of them seemed to have put the citadel as the final goal in their minds, but to me I needed to conquer the leaders and their troops.

“Because if the princess has even half the tactical mind you all think she does, she’ll use it like a jar to trap us. She will lay a siege, fling attacks from a distance, and raid with her elites. She’ll spill our blood without risking hers. No. We take the citadel, form up our ranks, bait the siege so she thinks her forces could take us down. Then we strike at Princess Almeria and separate her from her army.” I grew more confident as I talked it up. We could do this.

I could already see the end of the trial; we just needed to cross that finish line.

Someone burst through the door, one of Circe’s elites pausing in the frame. It was the same one who’d given way to Winnie’s soldier in yesterday’s fight. If she’d been real, I might have wanted revenge; here, she was a figment of the instance, and I’d use her like any soldier.

“Umm…” Her eyes flicked to Simone, still pressed against me. “Scouts report that Princess Almeria and her forces have moved to take the Citadel.”