Chapter 10 : Changement de rôle dans la pénombre Change of role in the semi-darkness

The group gradually dispersed. Taron takes the first quarter, Milo falls asleep almost immediately, and Kellan stays a little longer with Silas. Opaline settles further away, at the edge of light.

Aria had moved away from the fire to sit on a pile of broken stones facing the underground valley. As I approached, she heard my footsteps and moved away without even turning her head. I take a seat next to her. Behind us, the camp was only an orange glow; close enough that I can still make out the figures, far enough away that no one hears us talking in a low voice.

"You look concerned," she remarked.

"Yes. I'm mostly trying to figure out how to explain something to you. »

Instead of looking for a better introduction, I opened a new tab on my watch and placed the screen between us. The name displayed in white always seemed strange to me.

"Opaline has managed to awaken my passive side. My watch gives it a name: the White Knight. »

Aria immediately moved closer to look at the screen. Her shoulder brushed against mine as she leaned toward my wrist.

"What is a liability?"

I keep my eyes glued to my watch. Explain something that I barely understood myself, making me feel like I was walking in the dark.

"A kind of power. 404 said that we all had one and that it would eventually reveal itself if we met certain conditions. Until now, I didn't even know what it was like. »

She read the name on my watch again.

"And that's really what just happened to you? How did you do it? »

I exhaled, torn between the desire to answer him clearly and the desire to gain a few more seconds.

"Let's say that Opaline can perceive a kind of aura around us. She noticed something in mine and tried to provoke a reaction. »

I told her about the fight: Opaline's certainty that she could avoid me, the stone under her heel and my fist that hit her when she had already started her dodge.

"Did you hit him hard enough to throw her against a wall?"

"She threw herself into my fist."

"Casimir."

"Yes, I hit her."

I immediately expected a remark, or even a blow. However, his expression has expanded slightly. She seemed almost relieved to learn that this famous "reaction" had been provoked by punches and not otherwise.

"And you think it triggers when someone underestimates you?"

"According to Opaline, yes. I still can't believe it. A power that is triggered because someone thinks I'm too weak... It seems completely unreal to me. Well, okay, it's a bit silly to think that after all we've already seen in this world. But I must admit that it would explain some things. »

I then told him about Albert. On the last try, especially. Of that absurd angle and how his body had collapsed precisely at the moment my blade could reach his skull.

"I was wondering how you did it," Aria admits after a few seconds of thought.

"Me too."

Aria kept her eyes fixed on the valley.

"Do you really think it was just luck?"

I followed his gaze, without being able to support him.

"How could I have thought otherwise?"

From the gallery, I was waiting for his reaction. Part of me had prepared to see her up close, as if what I had just told her erased everything she had done during the argument. But Aria didn't seem offended or diminished. She was just thinking.

"It doesn't change anything about what happened before your last shot," she finally says. "Albert would have killed me if you hadn't intervened. And you could never have hit him in the head if I hadn't held him back. Your background may have played a role, but it didn't fight the whole battle for us. »

I was silent for a few seconds. I didn't realize how much I was waiting for her to say something like that. The uneasiness that had weighed on me since my conversation with Opaline has finally dissipated.

"Did you think I was going to be mad at you?" she asked.

I could have denied it. Pretending never to have doubted his reaction.

"A little," I admitted.

Aria finally turns her head towards me. In the dim light of the camp, I could make out his expression enough to understand what was about to happen.

"Idiot."

There was nothing mean in his voice. Coming from her, it almost sounded like tenderness. I looked down with a smile I couldn't really remember, and closed the tab on my watch.

"That's not the only reason I came to see you."

"I suspected it."

"Oh."

"Good?"

"I thought about the clan."

It took me a few seconds to find a way to continue.

"Since we arrived, I have told you that I am used to making decisions and taking responsibility. Until now, I hadn't really had the opportunity to prove it. Now that you have appointed me as the leader of the clan, I am faced with a choice that is truly up to me. »

A small, satisfied smile appeared on his face.

"I knew you'd come and tell me about it. I did well to entrust you with this title. I already feel myself taking flight, seeing the chef come back to me to follow to know which way. »

"So that's why you gave it to me..." That explains a lot of things. »

My own smile quickly faded. The joke made it easier, but it didn't solve what was really bothering me.

"The problem is that I'm afraid of making the wrong choice. To repeat the same mistakes as before. I don't want to shirk my responsibilities, especially after you entrusted me with this place because you trusted me. »

"It's not a problem. If you hesitate, come and talk to me and I will decide for you. Your responsibility becomes mine. I've already told you that. »

"That's not really the problem."

I absentmindedly ran my thumb along the edge of my watch, more to keep my hands busy than out of any real interest in the screen.

"Opaline pointed out to me that if everyone presents me as the leader, an opponent will have more reason to take me seriously before the fight even starts."

"So she wants you to pretend to be useless?"

"Put like that, his advice becomes much less flattering."

Amusement returns to her voice.

"What she told me above all was that a façade would not last long. If someone else is going to be seen to be in charge, it has to be authentic. »

This time, she didn't answer immediately. Still, I knew the following sentence from the gallery. Saying it out loud still requires more effort than expected.

"Remember our first night at Briana's?"

"Of course. I will never forget it. »

His tone immediately made me regret my choice of starting point.

"When you told me that you still felt like you could exercise some authority over me," I continued.

A discreet smile appeared at the corner of his lips.

"What I remember most of all is that you didn't seem very opposed to the idea."

"That's precisely why I hesitated to start there."

"Too late."

A sigh escaped me in spite of myself. She had this way of cutting me off in just two words, as if she knew exactly where to put my foot to prevent me from fleeing.

"Excuse me if I repeat myself," I said in a lower voice. "All my life, I've ended up being the one who decides. Not necessarily by choice. Sometimes it was just easier to take matters into your own hands than to wait for someone else to do it. In the end, it became a reflex. A place that I took back without even realizing it... But with you, it's different. »

This time, Aria wasn't kidding.

"Different in what way?"

"When you take the lead, I don't feel the need to take it back immediately afterwards."

"Then you like it."

"I knew you would only keep this party."

"Because I like it when you like it too."

"It allows me to rest, above all," I replied, laughing in spite of myself.

And it was true. I had understood this long before Opaline told me about my passivity. His suggestion had simply forced me to formulate. With Aria, letting someone else decide didn't feel like I was giving up something I should have kept.

I preferred not to dwell any longer on the ease with which this idea suited me.

"I wish you would become the official leader of the clan."

This time, Aria didn't respond immediately.

"Are you serious?"

"Yes."

"Because of your past?"

The question was legitimate. It was even the one I had wanted to prevent him from asking.

"That's what made me think about it now. But if I only wanted to deceive our enemies, I could ask you to play the role of leader before them. That's not what I want. »

"So, what do you want?"

"So that this place really belongs to you."

I took a few seconds before continuing.

"I will continue to define the strategies. I'll tell you when an idea seems bad to me, and I'm not going to stop thinking just because your name will appear on top of mine on a screen. But I don't want every decision to be made automatically by me. »

"And you would like them to come back to me."

"Yes. Well... if that's okay with you, of course. »

For once, Aria didn't take the opportunity to remind me which of us preferred to have the last word. She remained silent, as if she was still checking that I was really offering it to her.

"And you?" she asks at last.

"What about me?"

"If I become a leader, do you really accept that I am the one who decides?"

The valley suddenly became much more interesting. I keep my eyes fixed straight ahead for a few seconds, as if the darkness could give me a better answer.

"Yes."

"Even when you don't like my decision?"

"I'll tell you if there's a problem."

"That's still not my question, Casimir."

Of course not.

I finally turned my head to her. This time, Aria wasn't smiling anymore. She wanted a real answer, not a way to evade the problem.

I thought back to all those times when a discussion ended up coming back to me because no one wanted to decide. I had gotten into the habit of taking matters into my own hands without even thinking about it. Giving it up would probably not be as simple as I thought.

"I want to trust you without going back on my decision as soon as it no longer suits me."

His expression softened slightly.

"I decide, and you follow me."

I knew perfectly well that she was choosing the wording that suited her best.

"For the clan, yes."

"So we're going to start with that."

I looked at her sideways.

"This clarification does not reassure me at all."

"You don't realize what you just gave me."

"A worrying amount of power, probably."

A laugh escaped him. Then, suddenly, she takes me in her arms.

I stand still for a moment, surprised, before returning her embrace. Aria gradually relaxed against me. I didn't really expect this conversation to end like this, but I didn't want to complain about it.

"This is the first time someone has offered me this place," she whispered.

His sentence surprised me more than I would have thought. I thought back to all her provocations, her demands, the way she pushed the limits without ceasing to see how far I would let her go. Until now, I had mostly believed that she liked to have the upper hand. I understand now that a part of her may also be expecting someone to eventually ask her to calm down.

I hugged her a little tighter, not to hold her back, but to let her know that I had no intention of taking back what I had just given her.

"Because this place has your name on it."

Aria stepped back just enough to find my face. She doesn't leave my arms completely; She simply takes the necessary distance to look me straight in the eye.

"And so, the place just below mine has yours."

"That's absolutely not what I was trying to say."

"That's what I heard. And I really like that. »

Her smile was enough for me to understand that this conversation was probably going to last me for a long time.

"Of course."

"I warn you though: if you give me the advantage, I don't promise to give it back to you as soon as you've had enough."

At first, I thought it was a new provocation. With Aria, the line between acting and seriousness was sometimes dangerously blurred. She liked to press where my certainties wavered, especially when I gave her the opportunity in my own words.

And yet, this time, she wasn't just smiling to make me give in. She was sincerely waiting for my answer.

She loved to win, of course. Even more so when I offer her a victory without her having to snatch it from her. But behind this family satisfaction, something persisted. A more discreet, almost fragile prudence, as if a part of her was already preparing to see me step back and take back what I had just given her.

"I could regret it later. This does not mean, however, that I withdraw what I have just said. »

This time, the tension she was holding back seemed to finally ease. Not brutally, more like a loose rope after being tightened for too long. His shoulders relaxed and his gaze regained a more serene assurance.

"So it's understood. I become the leader of the clan. »

"Okay."

"No. At your orders. »

It took me a moment to understand that she was only half-joking.

"Do you really insist on this point?"

"I insist on hearing it from your lips."

Of course. She didn't just want my agreement. She wanted the words to exist, to cross my lips.

"At your orders, then."

The smile that lit up his face immediately made me regret the ease with which the words had come out of me. Not enough to remove them, alas.

I opened the clan tab. My name always appeared at the top of the list, with an option right below.

Clan Management

Leadership transfer

I selected Aria and confirmed. The watch vibrated on my wrist before displaying a confirmation.

Aria became the leader of the clan.

Aria checks her own screen. His name now appeared above mine.

She reread the confirmation a first time, then a second, as if the order of the names could change by staring at the screen. The dim light from her watch cast white reflections on her face, but she said nothing.

I had never seen her so quiet after getting something. Usually, Aria savored her victories. She commented on them, extended them, always locating the means of making me understand that I had given ground and that she intended to remember it.

Not this time.

His silence gave the moment a greater gravity than any triumphant remark. She had just gotten exactly what she wanted, and yet her gaze remained riveted on the screen, imbued with an almost anxious caution. As if this place, once so clearly described, had suddenly taken on a dimension that went beyond the framework of the game she had imagined.

After a few seconds, she seems to remember that I was still there. She put away her watch, rummaged through the bag next to her, and pulled out a small purse.

"Extra rations. Put them on with the common provisions, and then come back and sit down next to me. »

The request was formulated with a disarming naturalness, as if, barely a minute after her appointment, it was obvious that she was already testing the limits of her new role.

"Are you starting yet?"

"I have to check if you're sincere."

I looked down at the pouch she was handing me. It wasn't heavy. Neither does the gesture, at first glance. And yet, he carried this quiet precision of the little trials that Aria sowed in my path to see if my words stood the test of reality.

"Very good. I will assume the consequences of my words," I replied as I took the scholarship.

"Wise decision."

I walked through the camp to the common aid station. Behind me, his laughter accompanied me all the way, light, satisfied, almost too joyful for a simple bag of rations.

By packing the package with the rest, I thought I had understood our agreement: Aria would indeed take over the leadership of the clan, I would stop being the only one to decide everything, and I would continue to think by her side. A fairer sharing. And simpler. Maybe even healthier.

I closed the store with this reassuring certainty.

She had understood something else.

When I came back to the broken rock, the scene had already changed. Opaline had joined Aria and was standing next to her, as if she had only been waiting for me to return for the rest to begin. Aria no longer looked like someone testing a joke. His silence of a moment ago had not disappeared; He had simply moved elsewhere, in her eyes, in this new way she had of waiting for me.

I sat down next to them, with the distinct impression that the exchange was only the first order in a long series. Opaline looks at me, then at Aria. From her expression, I understood that she had guessed what had just happened.

"You didn't waste any time," she remarked.

"I would have spent hours looking for a better way to say it."

"A better way to say what? Our conversation? Aria asked.

"I told you that Opaline had advised me not to appear as the leader of the group anymore."

"For the White Knight," says Opaline. "Not for others."

Aria raised her head slightly.

"Oh yes. You mentioned that. »

"His aura reacted when I was certain that he posed no threat to me," explains Opaline. "I just pointed out to him that presenting himself as the leader of the group might make this kind of situation rarer."

"So you advised him to stop being the undisputed leader."

"Generally speaking, yes."

Aria slowly turns to me. Not only had she just listened to the explanation, but she was reorganizing our entire conversation around this new detail. I was already familiar with this expression. The one she wore when she detected a flaw, tiny in appearance, but big enough to slip all her logic into it.

"I understand better now. You needed someone to take the attention away from you. »

"That's what started the discussion. You probably haven't forgotten everything until the party you're interested in... »

"No, I haven't forgotten. It's just that you didn't ask me to pretend. »

"No."

"You have entrusted me with the responsibility of the clan. And you agreed to follow my decisions. »

"Yes."

"And my orders," she added, unable to conceal her satisfaction any longer.

His conclusion sounded with a certainty far too comfortable for his taste. Everything I had just explained, everything I had tried to nuance, was a simple observation: Aria had won more than expected, and she was counting on remembering it.

I felt the trap close with almost admirable precision. The worst part was that I couldn't even pretend she was really wrong.

"You can leave whenever you want," I said to Opaline.

"I'm very comfortable here."

Aria finally left her seat to walk slowly along the edge, as if staying still wasn't enough to contain everything she had just figured out.

"So," she sums up, "Opaline advised you a minimal tactical solution and you decided to seize the opportunity to place yourself under my authority."

"Seizing the opportunity is a very meaningful expression."

"I think that's a perfect fit."

"I only advised him not to present himself as the undisputed leader," confirmed Opaline. "Everything else comes from him."

"Don't put your nonsense in his head."

"I didn't invent anything."

Aria came back to me without hurrying. This time his amusement had lost its lightness; With her hands clasped behind her back, she was obviously trying to test my resolve in the face of what I had just proposed to her.

"So it's even better than I thought."

"I'm beginning to regret having waited for your return before explaining the past to you."

"Oh, stop! You were waiting for me wisely, like a good little dog. »

Next to me, Opaline suppressed a laugh without even trying to hide the pleasure she was taking at my expense. Then Aria resumed her walk along the edge, visibly delighted to examine every consequence of what I had just granted her.

"And since you have set no limits for me..." I imagine that also includes the clan members, our nights together, the punishments... »

I felt the problem coming a second too late.

Aria finally stopped.

«… and even fights."

I opened my mouth without finding an answer. I had never talked about arguments. Not clearly. And I didn't say the opposite either.

For me, entrusting the clan to Aria meant no longer carrying all the daily decisions alone. I would naturally continue to develop our strategies. She understood perfectly well that my "I will follow your decisions" covered absolutely everything.

I could have corrected it on the spot.

I didn't. For the moment, I didn't want to erase his happiness by a distinction that we would have all the time in the world to discover.

"Do you regret it already?" she asked.

"Of course."

"Perfect."

His confidence immediately dissipated, as if my regrets, expressed later, to confirm that this arrangement was perfectly suited to him.

"In that case, I consider you to be entirely mine."

The sentence remains suspended for a second too long between us. The more the conversation progressed, the more I understood that every word could turn against me with disturbing precision.

Next to us, Opaline slowly brings a hand to her forehead. She was visibly beginning to understand what person Aria was becoming again before her eyes, and her attitude suggested that she already regretted having participated in the experiment. I understand it.

"The more this conversation progresses, the worse the situation gets."

"I am not asking for your opinion. You say, "Yes, Aria," and that's it. »

She had adopted that almost royal tone that she loved so much when she thought she had won. And yet, she remained in front of me, without trying to impose anything. All his assurance lay in his words; for the rest, she was waiting for my answer.

I could laugh, refuse, remind him that the game ended there. She knew it as well as I did.

I let a second pass.

"Yes... Aria. »

The satisfaction that immediately lit up his face should probably have worried me more.

She came back to sit next to me, now far too sure that she had gotten exactly what she wanted.

"So we agree."

"On your version, especially."

"It's the only one that matters now."

I was going to answer her when she grabbed my sleeve.

This time, something had really changed in his expression.

"I will become so strong that none of you will have a reason to leave."

The fact that no one changed anything: she wasn't just talking about me anymore.

The title, the orders, his joy at having won this little battle concealed something more fragile. Aria had perceived, in this new place, a way of becoming impossible to abandon.

I wanted to tell her that she didn't have to deserve the right to stay with us. That his presence was born neither of his ability to command, nor of a victory, nor of what it depends on could bring us.

I can't find the words to say it without turning the moment into a speech. I simply put my hand on his; it has not withdrawn it.

In the distance, the fire crackled. Aria was now the leader of the clan.

As for me, I remain convinced that we understood the same thing.

The golems would soon make it their mission to prove me wrong.