Chapter 479: What We Choose to Carry

Mary froze at the doorway.

For half a second, she only took in the scene in front of her. Orion was laughing loudly with joy.

Her brows lifted slowly.

Her gaze slid past him.

And landed on Sophia.

Mary’s expression softened immediately.

It was subtle. Almost imperceptible. But it was there.

"Well," she said quietly, stepping fully into the room. Her heavy boots sounded much louder than they should have on the wooden floor. "I don’t think I’ve ever seen him laugh like that except when he’s with people he really likes."

Sophia smiled at Mary, who walked closer.

"You’re the reason, aren’t you?"

Sophia nodded with pride, her smile still on her face.

"I am," she said. "But... I didn’t tell a joke. I was just being honest."

Orion snorted beside her.

"I know," he said.

Sophia glanced at him.

He was still crouched in front of her. He patted her hands, then rose to his feet.

Before Sophia could protest the sudden shift, he leaned down and pressed a light kiss into her hair, then he made a face.

"You need to wash your hair, shorty," he told her.

Sophia rolled her eyes. "I just recovered. Of course it’ll be dirty. And besides, I didn’t tell you to place a kiss there."

Orion gave her a look. His lips twitched as he spoke. "Oh? Would you have preferred it if I had kissed you someplace else?"

Sophia gave him a look. "Where?"

He smiled at her. "It depends on you, shorty. There are different places I can kiss. For example," he said and leaned so his mouth was right next to her ear. "...your lips... or your shoulders... perhaps your neck... your br—"

Someone cleared their throat loudly, and Orion straightened. He hid his smile as he turned to Mary and the two guards with her, who were failing at pretending to look elsewhere.

Mary stared, mirth in her eyes.

"All right," Orion said immediately, schooling his voice and expression. He did not address the fact that Mary and the guards had almost witnessed something they should not have witnessed.

"We need to clear some things out of this house," he told them.

Mary followed his glance toward the floor and the table. She noticed the parchments scattered around. The last time she had been here, she hadn’t paid any attention to them because she had been in a hurry to get back to the council hall. That was neglect on her part, and she should have done her job better.

Mary nodded once.

"The parchments drawn on, right?" she asked him.

Orion nodded.

Sophia lifted her head.

"I can help," she said immediately.

Orion turned back to her.

"No."

She frowned.

"Orion—"

"I need to take you back to the medical facility," he said calmly. "I promised to do so."

"I don’t think I should go yet, though," Sophia protested. "Especially after what we just learned. Not after what he told us."

Orion held her gaze.

"I know," he said quietly. "And I’m still not letting you walk around this house, especially with that ankle of yours."

Sophia glanced down at her ankle.

Then back up.

"It still hurts," she admitted. "But that doesn’t mean I can’t help."

Orion shook his head.

"No."

She opened her mouth to argue again, but he cut in gently.

"You’re staying on the chair. You’re not lifting anything. You’re not bending over parchments scattered all over the floor."

Sophia crossed her arms.

Mary cleared her throat.

Both of them looked at her.

"You just woke up," Mary said to Sophia, her voice soft. "You should rest. That goes for you too," she added, flicking a look at Orion. "You have not had enough rest since you came back."

Orion’s lips twitched faintly.

Mary turned toward the guards.

"We’ll gather everything. And carefully, too. I was the one who placed him in the house. I should have checked and done better. Maybe we wouldn’t be doing this now," she told them.

Her eyes cut briefly to the guards.

They straightened immediately and nodded.

"Go," Mary repeated. "Both of you."

Orion nodded.

He turned back toward Sophia.

And before she could react, he bent and slipped one arm beneath her knees and the other around her back.

"What—Orion!"

He lifted her easily.

"Put me down."

"No."

Her hands immediately grabbed at his sleeve.

"I can walk."

"True, but given your ankle, you’d limp," he told her.

"So?" she asked him. "You can’t just carry me everywhere."

"I can carry you out of this house."

"I need to exercise the leg."

"You can exercise it another day."

Her mouth fell open.

"If I don’t move it, it’ll become useless."

Orion paused mid-step.

Slowly, he looked down at her.

Sophia looked right back at him, and their gazes locked.

"Are you giving up?" she asked quietly.

He shook his head. "Think again, shorty. I’ll carry you everywhere and also every day until you recover fully."

Sophia closed her eyes and let out a deep, dramatic sigh, and then she opened them again.

"If you drop me," she said flatly, "I will hit you."

His mouth curved at that.

"I’m not dropping you," he told her softly. "And I never will. You seem to always forget that."

Sophia stared at him, her arms now wrapped around his neck.

"Mary’s right. You need to rest. I can see how tired you are."

"Did you just jump from one conversation to the other?" Orion asked her, barely holding back his laughter.

Sophia shrugged her shoulders. Orion shook his head as he made his way outside Eldric’s house.

Orion walked with Sophia slowly, as if savouring her weight in his arms.

"Shorty, just so you know, today may be the only day you get to rest. There’s a lot to be done, questions to be answered, and we need you for most of them," he told her.

Sophia nodded. "I know that," she told him. She was about to speak again when her stomach growled.

Orion paused, and both he and Sophia stared at her stomach.

"That’s one hungry beast," Orion muttered, barely holding back his laughter.