The Hidden Princess At All-Boys Alpha Academy

Chapter 0369

"I knew it was spring," he murmurs, his head still hanging as he gets back on track, "because the riverbank was seriously muddy. Like, I kept slipping in it, couldn't keep my footing, annoying as hell. In winter, it's frozen solid. In summer, it's so dry that the dirt...puffs up in the air."

He sighs, raising his eyes to mine, and shrugs. And I smile a little, a small part of me really liking the idea that he told the passing of the year by how difficult it was not to slip and fall face-first into a river. But I don't say anything, just letting him continue.

*They sent us out, one day, to collect wood, of all things." His face screws up in confusion. "And you have to understand, Ari, like....we didn't collect wood - not me and the guys from my barracks. We were warriors at this point - not even in training anymore. Our jobs were to eat, and to... work out, and spar, for lack of better terms. And to keep the barracks clean. I was never given chores outside the barracks like collecting wood - not unless it was an emergency or something."

He continues, then, telling me about how the elders sent them out into the forest to collect firewood, instructed to bring back as much as they could carry.

*I was collecting by the stream," he murmurs, his eyes going distant as he remembers, "and I was getting...pissed, because all the wood was wet, because I knew it wasn't going to be any good in the fireplace. And then, suddenly... she was there."

I ask,

She was just there, in the woods with me. Like she'd just appeared or

you do?" I ask, my voice quiet

he does when he's embarrassed. I grin, watching him, not able to help it. "I was just so

at this because....I mean, it's cute, isn't it? A girl and a boy meet in a forest, and my sweetheart Jacks

she...she stopped me. Called out to me, told me to stay. Called me by my name.

see something there, about how that means something

and his voice grows low like he's still afraid. "When I said, before, that women were forbidden - I mean forbidden. I knew that this wasn't allowed. I knew that even talking to her was off-limits,

breath like it's hard to tell, and I scootch closer to him, wanting him to feel my support. Because I can tell that

was really, really nice to me, Ariel," he says softly, and I nod, because I believe him. I clench my teeth and close down the bond a little because I don't want him to see how incredibly sorry it makes me - that a girl was