12.

Elai's POV

It is late at night. I am unable to sleep; I kept thinking back about Arlon’s change of attitude. He seemed annoyed the moment Cesilia and Connie had left. I am curious about him, about why he acts the way he does. My fingers slam down on random tiles of the piano; I do not know how to play this instrument. I had tried learning how to play the lyre, but that wasn’t my cup of tea, either. I did not have enough motivation like I had when I was learning the old Lylenian language. I play as loud as I can, a small grin on my face. I hope he can hear me play. I hope it irks him.
Even though I was hoping for it, I still get startled when the door opens up. It is an empty room besides the piano, and there are quite a lot of paintings hanging around the room. Arlon’s mothers and sibling, I suppose. There is also a portrait of a man with long blonde hair, like me. But it does not look like he belongs to the family, I wonder who he is.
Arlon walks up to me with a quick, irritated pace. He has his hands bawled into fists and his eyebrows furrowed. There is enough moonlight to see the expression on his face and it amuses me. He does not look happy. I stop playing and look up at him, trying to suppress my grin. “Is this what I get for being welcoming to you? Do you want me to lock you up in the dungeons and feed you what even my cat does not dare to eat?” I have not seen a cat walk around yet, but I surely like the idea of it. his tone is stern and I understand that he is not kidding, but I let out a chuckle anyways.
“You said I was allowed to play during dinner, remember? To make sure I had something to do with my days because you don’t want me to go outside.” I can’t suppress the undertone of hatred in my voice. I cannot help but show to him that I do not like him, even though I had already blushed in his presence, even though I had already laughed at his remarks. I was nervous back then. Now I am calm. Now I remember what I came to do here in Turi.
“It’d be a shame if I did not use that privilege, right, my king?” I say the words so vilely that it brings Arlon to grab my jaw. It forces me to look up at him, but I do not flinch even a little bit. “If you use that attitude towards me one more time, I will have no choice but to lock you up.” He’s gritting his teeth and his eyes are angry. His fingers are heating up against my skin, and if they burn any more than this, It will hurt my skin. I do not care, though, and I keep my eyes locked into his so that he knows. He is keeping me here like my father used to do, and I will not forgive him for it, even though he has a good reason to. He does not know he has a good reason. He does not know he is right about me, that he can’t trust me, that I am living a bright lie right now.
“How about this.. I will stop this madness if you teach me how to play.” The words fall out of my mouth before I can think twice about them. I do not know why that sounded like a good idea in my head. Maybe it was my way of getting out of the threat of locking me up. Arlon’s frown deepens, eyes never leaving mine and fingertips still burning against my cheeks. He is thinking deep enough for me to notice; he is considering. I have to continue.
“See the bright side of it! I’ll be able to play you some tunes when you can’t sleep.” I do not know if that helps, but seeming that he is just as awake as I am this late at night, I guessed that he does not sleep all too well, or too long for that matter. It was my only chance at continuing, a small smile appearing on my squished face.
“Fine. I will teach you how to play. Will you please stop, then? I’ve got work to do.” I was correct, because who in their right mind works late at night? He lets go of my face and wants to turn around, but I can’t help but want to tease him a bit more. “I want my first lesson right now, though.”
I can hear the deep breath Arlon takes. He is probably cursing the moon for ever making him think taking me in was a good choice. I press my fingers down onto the keys once more, the false notes making Arlon turn around. “Fine!” He hisses out as he takes the few steps back. He sits beside me and I can feel the heat coming off his naked torso. It warms me up and almost lures me in. I want to fall asleep with this heat; it flushes my cheeks in no time.
“Do you do that yourself?” I stop Arlon right before he was going to start playing a tune. “Hm?” He raises his eyebrows, and for a split second, his attitude slips away from him. He is difficult to figure out. I had grown a talent of being able to read people in the time I lived inside of the walls of Lyle’s castle, but Arlon seems impossible. I can’t figure out even the simplest thing about him.
“You- heat up your body, right?” I’m not sure if it is weird that I noticed that he was getting hotter. I can’t see if it flushes his face as it does mine. It is too dark to see. I do see the small smile that appears on his face, though. “I do. It allows me to walk around like this.” He gently slaps his hand against his chest a few times. It makes me giggle a little. Why?
I let out a soft hum. “So you are a no clothes kind of man?”
“And you’re a robe kind of man?” He answers my question with another question.
“You are the very first guest that dared to show up in a robe during a dinner with the king.” Arlon nudged me a little. Where did his attitude go now that he’s sitting next to me? “I did not feel like putting on your royal clothes and walk around like- a- prince..” Shit. I was too late to swallow the word away. “It does not matter if you do. I do not think my staff believes I will ever find someone to marry ever again.” He raises his eyebrows and lets his eyes look down at the tiles. He plays a few seconds, but they are enough to make me relax a bit. He’s good at this.
“And why is that?” I ask through the music. His fingers slow down and eventually stop, hands pressing down onto the tiles until the noise dies down.
“I would rather not talk about that.” His accent is thicker when he says those words. It is obvious that something had happened in his love life. I wish I could ask him more, but I do not want to invade his personal space. I am not like that.
I place my fingers next to his. His hand is larger than mine, they press down the entire tile without a problem. My delicate fingers can’t. My skin is pale next to his, but it somehow flows into one another perfectly. I swallow and quickly look away from our hands. That was.. odd.