Elsbeth's Drama

Elsbeth’s voice was soft and cheerful as she approached. “Timmie, are you ready to leave?”

I blinked, looking up from my notes. Elsbeth stood in the aisle just a few steps away, her hands folded neatly over the sash of her plain dress, a small tilt to her head as she studied my expression.

“You looked… very engrossed,” she added with a more cautious tone, her eyes dipping to the ink-stained pages in my lap. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

I smiled and shut the notebook with a soft clap. “No interruption at all. I’m ready.”

Sister Anvey gave no farewell. She stood up and quietly neared the altar, hands clasped, posture straight. Her expression, while not warmed, exuded satisfaction.

“Come on, Sister Anvey. Haven’t you warmed up to me a bit?” I asked, rising. “I thought we were getting along.”

Her brow twitched.

“I mean, look at this,” I continued, holding up the notebook. “Filled to the brim. You can’t say you hated it. I think I even saw you smile.”

She exhaled through her nose. “You were attentive. I’ll give you that. But that does not excuse the rest of you.”

“The rest of me?” I asked.

Her expression darkened like thunderclouds were forming. “You’re still a man. Even if Lady Elsbeth and Ravela vouch for you.”

I squinted. “Wait, what does Ravela have to do with anything?”

Anvey turned her sharp gaze to Elsbeth. “You shouldn’t be alone with him.”

Elsbeth's smile faltered.

“He reeks of withheld temptation,” Anvey continued. “He may be charming, but that’s what makes him dangerous.” She turned to me again. “I am even more certain of it now.”

I opened my mouth. Then closed it. Then opened it again. “I am, again, insulted. And also confused. I thought we were doing pretty well!”

Anvey’s eyes narrowed. “You are a good student. Perhaps that was to be expected given your profession. That is all I am willing to concede. Your guilt has not changed.”

She turned and walked back toward the inner rooms, steps quiet against the stone floor.

I glanced over at Elsbeth, whose expression was now unreadable beneath her lowered hood.

***

We walked in silence for a while after leaving the temple.

The streets were even quieter now, a couple of hours from dusk. It was surprising. The more ordinary areas would be filling with relieved laughter right around now. The sound of Elsbeth’s boots clicking gently along the uneven stone path as we moved together was the most comforting thing.

“I thought Anvey was nice,” I finally said. “Behind the intensity.”

Elsbeth nodded, eyes still cast downward. “But she spoke to you for a long time. I’m glad. Did you learn what you hoped to?”

“I did,” I said. I turned to her with a grin. “I learned that people have auras.”

Elsbeth lifted her head, curiosity twinkling faintly. “Auras?”

“Yeah. The aura is the special space where magic happens—the space where your mana is allowed to influence the world outside your body. If it’s large enough, your magic reaches farther. That’s why the Saints were so amazing—their auras were enormous. Their magic could reach any corner of this city.”

“That’s…” She shook her head slowly, voice low in awe. “That’s incredible, Timmie.”

I looked at her carefully. “Did you know yours is bright?”

Elsbeth blinked. “Is that so?”

Her voice was light, but her fingers curled slightly beneath her cloak. Her steps grew just a little more cautious. She didn’t look comfortable at all.

Still, I smiled to myself. Through Mana Vision, I had seen the aurora-like veils that surrounded her body. She had the second most powerful mana network I’d ever seen—just beneath the First Protagonist’s. And yet… Anvey had a surprising description of it.

“And your aura stays close to your body,” I said. “Anvey kept calling you pure.” I chuckled. “I don’t need auras to see that.”

Elsbeth said nothing to that. Her expression was unreadable, but she kept her head slightly lowered.

We walked for a few more steps before she gently said, “I still have a few hours before I return. If it’s alright… I’d like to spend them with you.”

I stopped walking, then smiled—broad and unable to hide it. “I’d like that too.”

***

Meredi’s special away-from-home stew was simple and hearty, with soft bread to mop up the thick broth. The backroom of my workshop had the faint smell of alchemical salts and synthetic fumes, but the stew’s scent masked it better than any freshener could.

“Meredi’s stew… I feel like I’m a child again,” Elsbeth said, setting her spoon down. “I see her smiling whenever I catch the scent. I’m glad she still smiles as much as I remembered.”

“She does,” I said. “Her happiness is contagious.”

Elsbeth giggled. She wiped the corner of her mouth, a little more relaxed now, though her hood still hung near her shoulders. Her scarf was undone. Her hair had fallen slightly out of its braid.

She looked comfortable. If there were a single scene that I wanted repeated toward infinity, it would be this one.

“Timmie?”

My pulse quickened, just a bit.

“Thank you for today,” she said, looking at me—not past me, not at the wall, but straight into my eyes.

I nodded. “I should be the one thanking you. You pulled me out of my home.”

Silence stretched for a few minutes.

“I didn’t think I’d get as much out of it as I did,” I said, leaning back in my chair. “I’m glad you took me along with you.”

Elsbeth tucked a stray lock behind her ear. “It was a very good day.”

“I’m glad you still wanted to spend time with me. That was the only thing I was a little sad about. I thought we were going to receive that lecture together.”

“Oh.”

Her fingers lingered at her cheek, her expression softening—then darting away again, as if embarrassed by the thought.

Silence returned.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I felt the mood was shifting. I could feel it in my stomach.

“May I use your restroom?” she asked.

“Yeah. Of course.”

I led her up the stairs, showed her the door to the bathroom, and then sat in my bedroom.

Sister Anvey’s warning came to mind. I huffed and pulled out my notebook.

“I’m the embodiment of restraint,” I muttered. “People wish they had my restraint.”

My notes were excellent. I was such a good note-taker. All my questions were answered, and now I had new info I could reference in the future.

“Timmie?” Elsbeth said, standing at the doorway. She showed me a smile and looked around. “This is your bedroom?”

I put my notebook on the nightstand. “The one and only. Not very exciting.” I gestured to the desk and chair in the corner. “Please, take a seat if you want.”

She smiled again and shyly stepped inside.

It was only when she looked around with childlike whimsy that I remembered that she was the City Lord’s wife. I thanked my deep-seated anger that, at this rate, only grew hotter and brighter with every passing day.

I didn’t care about that Lord at all, or the sanctity of his doomed marriage at all.

“When I was a girl, I always wanted to see what your room looked like.”

“Really?” I asked, mesmerized by the sight of her standing there like she was me when I stepped into the temple.

“Yes…”

I tried to smile, but I was sad. Elsbeth’s presence in Timaeus’s memories was fleeting. She was never really a focal point—just the annoying tag-along who followed Timaeus places while he was trying to collect things for his ‘experiments.’

“Standing here now,” she said, her words trailing off. She looked at me with a bashful smile. “It’s a little bit unreal.” Her eyes went to the empty space beside me. “May I sit there? Would that be okay?”

“Go ahead,” I replied.

She sat, smiling once before fully committing.

“I can’t imagine this room is better than yours,” I joked.

“It’s warmer,” she whispered back. “Erm, could you please remove the Burnmask?”

Our eyes met.

“I’d rather you not look at me and see this—the thing I must do to hide.”

“Sure, let me get some water and a rag.”

I collected what I needed and came back. Elsbeth presented her face and I gently began dissolving and removing the mask.

“Tell me if it hurts.”

A gentle smile curled her lips, and her pale cheeks reddened. “Of course,” she replied.

I wiped the last of the Burnmask from her cheek, careful not to press too hard. The pale skin beneath it was sensitive, still pink from where the alchemical seal had clung to her.

There was a quietness in the air now. Elsbeth exhaled slowly through her nose, lips slightly parted, eyes not quite meeting mine, but not pulling away either. She sat close—close enough that the edges of our knees brushed, the fabric of her cloak caught beneath my thigh.

“You’re better at removing it than I am,” she said, her voice quieter now.

“You have a long way to go, assistant.”

She smiled again, but it wavered. A breath left her slowly—one of those breaths people let out without realizing—and she shifted just slightly, as though caught between rising and staying still.

I placed the rag in the bowl and glanced at her. There was tension in her shoulders and a slight pinch to her brow. I suspected the heat beneath her cheeks had nothing to do with embarrassment.

I realized then that my own body had gone still in response, as though afraid to interrupt the atmosphere forming between us.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

Her lips parted. Her gaze darted toward me, then away, and then she pulled herself back—just barely, like she’d been seated too close to a fire.

“I mustn’t,” she said quietly. And then louder, like a woman willing herself back from a cliff. “I mustn’t.”

Her head bowed lower. She gripped the fabric of her dress at the knees, knuckles pale. She didn’t move. Didn’t even breathe for a heartbeat or two. Just sat there, trembling with some invisible force trying to tear her apart from the inside.

I blinked.

There was nothing subtle about it.

She looked like someone whose soul was locked in a cage made of vows, and every moment spent near me made the bars creak.

I leaned back slightly and stared.

She really was just sitting there.

But then it clicked.

She is dramatic.

Of course. Of course, she was like this.

Elsbeth was dramatic. Bigger than life. She wasn’t just a childhood friend archetype. She was the childhood friend who only had three lines of dialogue. Three lines that were absolutely packed with subtext, and clearly alluding to how miserable and tragic her life was. That was her character. That was what the devs highlighted.

And now I was seeing what happened when a woman like that was given a body, a mind, a past, and a real, desperate longing. Heck, this had already happened when I declared I wanted to go to the Noble Layers. She was so dramatic then, but I got so much out of that event.

And then a thought came to me.

What would happen if I leaned into this?

“Elsbeth,” I said, tone suddenly rich, theatric, even breathless. “I can hold back no longer. The truth wishes to break free.”

Her head whipped toward me with such speed that it startled me.

Her eyes were enormous—glinting like moonlit crystal, full of panic and trembling hope—and I swear, if the room had a curtain, she’d have flung herself into it.

“You!” she gasped.

She brought a hand to her mouth. Her body turned toward me entirely, as though she were magnetized, as though something in her couldn’t resist facing me now that the veil had teased that it could be lifted.

“You… shouldn’t say things like that,” she whispered, though she leaned closer even as she said it. “You might make someone… think something that could never be.”

“I know,” I replied, slowly reaching for her hand. “But I have been holding it in for so long. It hurts, Elsbeth. All I want is to speak it and give it form.”

She didn't pull away. Her fingers curled slightly against mine. Her breathing was louder now, shaking. She looked at our joined hands like they were a sin incarnate.

“I swore I would be good,” she said. “I swore I would be strong.”

“You are strong,” I replied. “You come all this way, hidden by shadows. You go and you help those kids and the Sisters. How could you be anything less than mighty?”

She shook her head like she was shaking off the imps called temptation clinging to her hair. “You shouldn’t say such things,” she breathed. “Not to me.”

“But I must,” I replied, matching her theatrics. “You’ve bewitched me, Elsbeth. I cannot go another moment pretending to be indifferent.”

“I am married,” she whispered, as though it were a curse.

“And I am damned,” I said, “for I am enamoured with you anyway.”

“Timmie!”

Her eyes glistened. Her lips parted just slightly. We were close—ridiculously close now. A breath away. Her whole frame leaned ever so slightly toward mine like a branch overburdened by rain. The light from the desk lamp flickered across her skin, catching every tremble.

I dramatically pulled away. “Maybe…”

“Timmie?” she asked, reaching for me.

“Maybe you’re right. I’m sorry! Damn it, Elsbeth, I am sorry!” I yelled.

“No!”

“But, I adore you!”

“Oh no….”

“I thought it would not be possible, but every minute I spend with you, I become more sure of it… Elsbeth… I will save you from the darkness that imprisons you!”

She pulled on my shoulder and forced me to confront her eyes as they searched mine.

“Please… tell me that again…”

Elsbeth gulped.

“Could you… Could you find the strength to tell me that again?”

I gripped her shaking, gentle, soft, fragile hand. “I am going to save you, Lady Elsbeth.”

Her eyes widened and she closed her eyes as her bared teeth clamped together. She let out a groan of frustration—

“Timmie!”

—and she gave me a passionate kiss. 

I didn't think it would happen, but just like that, I hit a milestone.