Interlude [h.s]

seventeen

They waltz around each other for a week.

Alouette stops trying to apologise, because she understands what kind of person he is now. She could do everything he wants, and still he wouldn't forgive her until he specifically wants to.

She spends her time observing him and making a mental note of everything he does. At night, when she's glowering at the ceiling and wants to break everything in his office out of spite, she soothes herself to sleep reminding herself she only has thirty more days to go before she finally makes her move.

She's never thought of herself as an assassin, but she can't deny she'll feel satisfaction when she'll fire her bullet right through his chest. She wonders if he'd notice at all. He'd have to have a heart to.

Anger is what fuels her day after day, what brings her to still show up at her desk every morning even though she knows Harry will make it his mission to let her know how displeased he is with her existence.

And yet, he doesn't make a move against her. She's heard many terrible stories about the end whoever tries to cross him meets, and while she starts waiting for a similar punishment to come to her too, it never does. It's as if he believes being openly ignored by him will be punishment enough. Normally she'd hate his arrogance and narcissism, but a small part of her can't deny it's the truth. She's withering like a flower forgotten in darkness for too long, starved for his attention as if it was a ray of sunlight.

She refuses to let him know, though. She casts her gaze down and does everything she's asked to do, even when his glare on her is so harsh she can feel it piercing through her, even when he pretends she isn't in front of him. She doesn't speak to him unless it's absolutely necessary, because she doesn't trust the words that would leave her mouth if she did.

Do you enjoy hurting other people's feelings?

I didn't mean to be where I was. I wasn't stalking you. I didn't even know you would be there. I don't know what that place even is.

I can't understand how I could be stupid enough to believe you're a good person after all.

If you don't stop acting like this I'll set your bedroom on fire.

Fuck you.

She doesn't say a word to him. He doesn't flinch.

The air is electric whenever they're in the same room. What she doesn't expect, though, is for it to spark and go up in flames.

That's exactly what it does.

She's sitting at her desk when the door to Harry's office opens harshly.

"Lark!"

She looks up, frowning when she sees no one other than the man himself walking towards her, holding something in his hands.

The side of her that has been suffering for the way he treated her is revived. She can't blame that little part of her soul for aching. She was both lonely and alone when she first arrived, it's no surprise she grew so dependant on Harry. It's no surprise she considered him something close to a friend, at some point, just for a little while. Someone that seemed to understand her more than everyone at the Revolution ever had.

But she was wrong. Harry isn't her friend. He's never been her friend. Harry doesn't care for friendship, he doesn't care about anyone but himself. She can only call herself stupid for forgetting it for some days.

"Yes, sir?" Her voice is a bit rough. She hasn't used it nearly as much in the last few days. It gets boring to talk to Evie after a while; she too has grown up sheltered in that palace, to the point that everything she says seems trivial and inconsequential.