The Villainess Wants To Retire-Chapter 364: Challenge

SOREN

The heavy oak doors of the sitting room yielded silently to my touch. I had intended to check in on Eris before heading to the baths to scrub the scent of iron and ozone from my skin, but the sight that met me stalled the breath in my lungs.

The afternoon light had faded into a deep, bruised indigo, leaving the room illuminated only by the dying embers of the hearth.

There, tangled in a nest of velvet cushions and discarded fairy-tale books, sat my world.

Eris was fast asleep, her head tilted back against the mahogany frame of the couch. Her hair was a wild, silken spill across her shoulders, and her lips were parted just slightly.

Draped over her, like a small, warm anchor, was Rael. His head was pillowed on her chest, his small hand fisted in the emerald wool of her robe.

They looked as though they had been carved from the same piece of peace, a portrait of soft breathing and absolute trust.

A sharp, sudden ache blossomed in my chest. It was a physical clench, a tightening of muscles I hadn’t known were tense.

This, I thought, my heart hammering a slow, heavy rhythm against my ribs. This is what I want. Not the throne. Not the frozen expanse of the north or the terrified bowing of dukes.

I wanted this quiet. I wanted a family. I wanted to be the man who kept the blizzard at bay so they could sleep like this forever.

I moved toward them, my boots making no sound on the thick rugs. I didn’t want to disturb the spell, but the sitting room would grow cold once the fire died. I reached down, sliding one arm beneath the crook of Eris’s knees and the other behind her back, supporting her spine and Rael’s weight simultaneously.

I lifted them together. Eris was light, a featherweight of silk and heat, while Rael was a solid, comforting burden on top of her. 𝓯𝓻𝒆𝙚𝒘𝓮𝙗𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝒍.𝙘𝓸𝙢

Neither woke. Eris merely shifted, her face burrowing instinctively into the crook of my neck, her skin radiating a faint, honey-sweet warmth.

I carried them through the archway and into the master bedchamber. The room was cool, smelling of lavender and the crisp winter air. I laid them onto the expansive bed, moving with a calculated, liquid grace to ensure the transition was seamless. I pulled the heavy furs over them, tucking the edges in with a hand that trembled slightly.

Rael mumbled something in his sleep, a tiny, fragmented word that sounded like "dragons", and Eris stirred, her eyelids fluttering.

"...Soren?" she breathed, the word barely a ghost of a sound.

"Shh," I whispered, leaning down to press a lingering kiss to her forehead. "Sleep, Eris. I have you."

"Mm..." she hummed, already sinking back into the depths of exhaustion.

Soren watched them for a moment longer, the blue glow of his eyes dimming to a soft, protective shimmer. They were perfect. They were his. The sheer intensity of that realization left him with a restless, thrumming energy that couldn’t be contained in a quiet room.

He needed to burn. He needed to move before he shook apart.

The training yard was a vast, open-air arena carved into the side of the mountain, partially shielded from the wind by high stone ramparts. Snow had been cleared into high, white walls, leaving a central pit of packed earth and frost.

When he arrived, the yard was thick with the sounds of industry, the rhythmic clack-clack of wooden practice swords, the grunts of knights in heavy mail, and the barking orders of drill instructors.

The silence that followed his entrance was instantaneous.

One by one, the knights stopped, their weapons lowering as they bent into deep, formal bows. Ryse, who had been reviewing a squad of archers, looked up with an expression of pure bewilderment.

"Back already?" Ryse asked, wiping sweat from his brow. "I thought you were settling in for the evening."

Soren grinned, and he felt the expression stretch wide and sharp across his face. "I have energy to burn, Ryse. Too much of it."

Jorel was standing nearby, leaning against a weapon rack. He looked rested, though his travel-worn clothes had been replaced by a simple training tunic. He watched the Emperor with a calculating, sharp-eyed curiosity. "Your Majesty? You look... restless."

Soren didn’t answer. Instead, he walked over to the rack and pulled a heavy practice sword from its cradle. The balanced steel felt right in his hand, an extension of the surging power in his blood. "I haven’t sparred in a while," he said, his voice carrying across the yard. "Who’s brave enough to remind me how it’s done?"

The crowd grew within minutes. It was a rare thing to see the Emperor in the pit. Most of the men knew him as a mage, a man who could snap a glacier with a thought or summon a blizzard with a gesture. His sword skills were an afterthought to them, a relic of his youth as a prince.

They were wrong.

The first opponent was a young knight, perhaps twenty, with a chest full of medals and a gaze full of confidence. He lasted thirty seconds. Soren didn’t even use magic; he simply moved faster than human eyes could track. A feint to the left, a parry that sent a vibration up the boy’s arm, and a flick of a wrist sent the sword spinning into a snowbank. The knight ended up on his back, staring at the grey sky with a confused blink.

The second was a veteran guard, a man who had survived a dozen border skirmishes. He lasted a minute. He was clever, using his shield to pin the blade, but Soren flowed around him like water. He felt effortless. It was as if the air itself were pushing him forward. He ended the bout with his practice blade resting gently against the man’s throat.

"Yield," Soren breathed.

"Yield, Sire," the guard panted, his eyes wide with a mix of fear and awe.

Then Ryse stepped in.

He knew he would lose, they had sparred hundreds of times but he was the only one who could truly push the tempo. They danced for two minutes, the sound of their blades ringing out in a rapid-fire staccato.

Ryse was strong, but Soren was something else entirely. He could feel the cold radiating off his skin, the ground beneath his feet turning to a slick, crystalline surface that only he could navigate. He forced Ryse to yield after disarming him with a brutal, twisting bind.

"You’re cheating," Ryse joked, his breath coming in ragged gasps. "You’re moving like a damn shadow, Soren."