𝒜 𝒞𝑜𝓊𝓇𝓉 𝑜𝒻 𝑅𝑒𝓈𝒾𝓈𝓉𝒶𝓃𝒸𝑒 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒮𝒸𝒶𝓇𝓈 | ᴀᴢʀɪᴇʟ

Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Arwen glowered at Cassian who sat in the ornate chair. Her glass jar freshly baked cookies that had been neatly stacked in there were now subjected to his large, clasping fingers. He hugged the jar to his sternum, feet kicked up on the matching ottoman. But she would be leaving for a few days and no doubt would have plenty of spare hours to bake more that he wouldn't be able to touch.

"I thought you ate a specific diet," she noted with a note of accusation. Azriel, seated beside her on the small lounge, snorted in agreement. Her eyes were sore but dried. Rhys had eventually winnowed them both up to her room where they had laid until she had cried all she could give. They spoke more after that, their words raw and open as they let their wounds bleed out together. Arwen felt sickly gross when he admitted how pathetic he had felt the last few days, knowing that her attitude in part had been a fuel. Never good at apologies, she could only hope that he took her weak attempt to heart.

"He is," Azriel agreed, a slight smile adorning his tanned cheeks.

"I'm stress eating," Cassian refuted, pointing a cookie towards them before shoving it in his mouth. Through a muffled mouth he added, "It doesn't count."

She flicked her eyes over his body. "The only thing you have to stress about is gaining a few pounds with how much you're eating." Arwen winced as he flicked crumbs across to her, one landing in the corner of her eye. "In all seriousness, why are you eating so much?"

Cassian paused momentarily, then shrugged as he resumed devouring but at a more eased pace. "You're stressing me out, kid."

"Kid? I'm nearly two hundred."

He flicked over another crumb. "You'll always be a kid to me, kid."

Arwen thumbed the crumb until it stuck to her skin and then sucked it off, giving her tongue a brief tang of its sugary sweetness. "Will you at least save Azriel a few? They're his favourite."

He crumpled his nose in distaste, but she knew he would follow the request either way. Azriel gave her a hint of a smile when she glanced in his direction, which may as well be a grin from the brooding spymaster. Arwen knew that he had his reservations about taking them since they had been made by her hand but once she left, he would be free to eat them if he pleased without consequence.

"I'm not sure I told anybody that." He sat forward, arms braced against the point of his thighs.

She smiled tiredly at another raspberry and white chocolate cookie being shoved into the general's mouth. "You always snack on them when they're around. More than you do other flavours. Call it an intuitive assumption."

A gnawing hunger arising in her stomach but untempted to attempt prying the jar free from the arms of the General Commander, Arwen rose and wandered into the kitchen, browsing the shelves. No doubt she'd have a generous meal for lunch, but that was another hour away. She drew to the woven basket of fruits, contemplating between the apples and oranges when Azriel meandered into the kitchen, no sign of Cassian behind him. He moved like a cat—silent and smooth.

"You know," Arwen began, plucking a ripened apple, "I honestly don't know how you're still their friend."

He lightly frowned, leaning his hip against the marble benchtop as she twisted the stem of the apple off. "Who?"

"All of them. Rhys and Mor have been talking for over an hour now and I doubt it's all been about work, the gossip mongers." He had told her he would fill Mor in with anything that needed to be done for the next week whilst he would be away with Arwen in their family cabin. A well-deserved break for the both of them, he told her. But being the prying person Arwen was, she very well knew that his schedule for the coming week was rather lighter than usual. "Cassian doesn't shut up either and he has a unique skill of finding the way under everybody's skin. You aren't much of a talker, yet you're still here. I think patience must be your virtue, spymaster."