Shocked, as if struck by lightning, Arabella froze. Her wide green eyes locked onto Cassius’s, staring at him as though he had just summoned a dragon from thin air.
What did he just say?
Bathe?
BATHE WHO?!
"NO!" The word tore from her lips, sharp and imdiate. Her arms snapped around her chest, her narrowed eyes blazing with fury. "You said you wouldn’t do anything like t-that to ! Are you going back on your word?!"
Cassius arched a brow, unimpressed. He observed her as if she were a cornered cat, ready to scratch his face off at the slightest provocation. With a sigh, he relented, "I said that?" He let the question linger, then, seeing the fire in her glare, decided against teasing further. "I won’t do anything. If I had wanted to do sothing like that, I would have done it from the start. But you need a bath."
His voice dropped into sothing kinder, no less authoritative, but edged with exasperation. "You do realize that anyone else who spoke to like this would have lost their head a long ti ago?"
"That’s your problem, not mine," she shot back, her stance rigid, prepared to fight him if he so much as reached for her.
Renard, standing nearby, felt his blood run cold. He had heard the stories, how Cassius was strangely lenient with Arabella, but this? Watching her defy him so openly, without consequence, was beyond belief.
Discreetly, he pinched his own cheek. But the sting confird it, this was real.
Cassius rolled his eyes, stepping back with a scoff. Crossing his arms, he tilted his chin in her direction and gave a lazy command.
"Alright then, stand up and walk four steps."
She frowned, watching him as if he were a predator lying in wait, ready to trip her the mont she moved. But Cassius remained oddly civil, his arms crossed over his chest, one brow arched in silent amusent. He said nothing, simply watching her sit there as if daring her to prove herself.
"I won’t bathe you if you manage four steps. That isn’t much, right?"
For so reason, she felt that he was into sothing and that he was confident he would win, but she couldn’t help falling for the devil’s tricks.
The challenge was clear. And she would not lose.
Gritting her teeth, Arabella pushed herself upright, determined to take the four steps he demanded.
The mont she stood, dizziness crashed over her like a wave, making her vision blur at the edges. She forced herself to move, though her limbs felt impossibly heavy, frozen stiff from the cold. The first step was sluggish, as if her body wasn’t fully convinced she could move at all. The second step wavered beneath her weight, her knees buckling, but she refused to fall.
Then ca the third step.
Her leg gave out.
She stumbled, her body lurching forward. But sheer stubbornness, defiance etched into every fiber of her being, pushed her to attempt the fourth step anyway.
It was a mistake.
This ti, she fell. Hard.
The world tilted. The sharp edge of a cupboard rushed toward her vision. There wasn’t even ti to scream, only to brace.
She squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for the impact.
When she dared to peek through her half-lidded eyes, she didn’t see the cold, unforgiving edge of the cupboard. Instead, she saw an arm, strong and steady, wrapped securely around her waist.
Cassius’s face was right in front of her, greeting her in a close proximity, which made her flinch as she could count the lashes that frad those red eyes.
His grip was firm and effortless as if catching her had been no more than a minor inconvenience. But it was his expression that made her lips purse. Those sharp, unreadable eyes held no surprise, only the silent, unimpressed judgnt of a man who had expected this outco all along.
See? You should have listened to .
The words weren’t spoken, but they were loud in the way he looked at her.
A slow, insincere smile curled on his lips, mocking, edged with amusent. When he finally spoke, sarcasm dripped from every syllable.
"Dear little bird," he mused, his tone infuriatingly smooth. "Have you finally realized that your master is always right?"
He clicked his tongue, shaking his head. "Fevered, wounded, thrown into a well, left to freeze in the night air... and yet, here you are. I suppose I should comnd your stubbornness. Most people in your position would have long since passed out."
His hold on her remained firm, unyielding. And despite the bite in his words, there was sothing else there, sothing dangerous, a quiet sort of unhappiness that she was just going to let herself get wounded for the second ti tonight.
He then remained quiet, staring at her, and she wondered what he was studying from her face. Her looks? Her green eyes? His gaze remained steady on her face, which made her curious about what was inside that head of his.
"I won’t touch you," Cassius said plainly, his tone almost bored. Then, with a slow, lazy grin, he added, "Not interested in soone as scrawny as you. Your arms are too small. Your neck—" He tilted his head, eyes gleaming with sothing dark. "I don’t have to explain how easily it would snap, do I?" he then sighed as if he was disappointed for being suspected in liking sothing like that.
Arabella’s irritation flared. Scrawny?
"Oh, please," she shot back, crossing her arms. "I don’t think there’s a single thing in this world that wouldn’t break with a snap of your fingers."
Cassius chuckled, unbothered. "Oh, how sweet. That almost sounded like admiration, little bird."
They glared at each other, locked in a silent battle of wills, the air between them thick with unspoken challenge. Anyone else might have feared Cassius’s sharp tongue, but Arabella had long since learned that pushing back was the only way to survive him.
Renard, who had been observing from the corner of the room, could hardly believe what he was witnessing. Was this... normal for them? It should have been odd, Cassius Crown, the ruthless Crown Prince, exchanging petty barbs with a human pet. But sohow, it was almost comical.
Cassius, apparently tiring of the exchange, suddenly snapped, "And what are you still doing there, Renard? Have you traded your brain for coins? Move and draw the bath."
"O- O-On the way, Your Highness!" Renard stamred, stumbling over his own feet as he bolted from the room, shutting the door behind him.
Silence fell.
Arabella turned back, only to freeze in horror.
Cassius had rolled up his sleeves.
She stared at him, stunned. He wasn’t joking. He was actually going to do it. Him? This man?
"Your Highness—" she started cautiously.
Cassius barely spared her a glance, his focus elsewhere. "Hmm?"
She hesitated, then pressed on, voice quieter but no less sharp. "Do you know how strange this is? A man who delights in tornting suddenly deciding to be... kind?" She narrowed her eyes. "What happened? Because this doesn’t seem like you at all."
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