1.5

Irini was forced to face the reality that she had become the wife of someone and was leaving the only home she had known. After waking up alone, she tried to dress into her knight's wear, only for the maids to remind her that it was no longer appropriate to wear the clothes she had wore every day for almost a decade.

After changing into casual riding clothes, she found her brother supervising the staff packing multiple wagons with her possessions.

Some of the guests who stayed overnight were also packing up to leave.

For a week he had bought her a lot of new possessions suitable for the South to distract himself. He deliberately kept those suitable for the North here.

As she had kindly reminded Anise yesterday, her new home was just a day away on the Wyvern. This was not goodbye, she could come back at any time and he made sure she would have everything here for when she visited again. Her room, this home, it was still her own even if she married.

Irini found her brother's fussing both unnecessary and a tad annoying.

Unknown to her, Ares mind was in a complete state. He was purely focusing on the tasks he could control to compensate.

The little girl he raised into a woman, the sister he thought he was going to have to raise the rest of his life, was leaving him. His only blood relative was leaving him. That in itself was terrifying enough.

Then the Emperor had sat him down over breakfast and told him someone was using assassins from the Asim Empire to target a select few nobles within their Empire.

Though the fact he couldn't understand the enemy's motives for the first time was disturbing, that was not what bothered him. They ended one war, and another would start; history shows war never ends. He was a knight before he was a Duke. His sword would never rest in its sheath for long.

What truly bothered him, what made him have a cold sweat all morning, was that the little girl he raised like his own child, was one of those targets.

Under his useless care, twice that dragon had intervened and killed the assassins sent to end her life. If nobody told him, would he have ever found out? 

Did the brat feel he was too unreliable? He wanted to ask her why. Why can't she just rely on him once instead of trying to solve it all by herself?

His companions and friends all joked he had it easy. That his little sister was an independent and capable girl, he should be grateful. Only he knew how much he longed for her to just ask for help once.

The only semblance of relief he found was that somehow, she tamed a dragon like a wolfhound. He may be made redundant, but at least finally she seemed able to ask someone for help.

"I'll be fine," she wrapped her arms around his waist, unable to bear seeing him look so haggard, "you just focus on expanding the mining industry now that our borders are peaceful." She smiled, encouraging him to follow the plot.

If he follows the plot, he gets his happily ever after and she gets to meet the baby niece.

Ares's hands grasped the thick cloak wrapped around her, smothering her into his erratically beating chest. 

"What should I do Rini, I don't want to let you go?" His hoarse voice held back a sob, conscious that all the people who depended on him to live were walking on by.

With her words, she must know what was coming. Yet she was willing to marry and go South despite it. She must really love that damn dragon.

Seeing the sister who hated people to the point of hiding in the woods, happily spending weeks, sometimes months at a time playing as a hermit witch with her beasts, suddenly engage in the politics of people, scared him endlessly.

Now that, thanks to the Empress, the Faen Empire was no longer a problem, he had already made plans with the Emperor this morning about reopening the mines 

As long as the Emperor worked hard to create an Heir with his mate, his land would no longer be a borderland and the demons above would officially become a part of their Empire. 

Despite this, they now needed to hurriedly develop and create new artifacts and weaponry, in preparation for the new looming war. It seemed they weren't even allowed to pass through winter in peace to recover.

If only he knew whether the new war was with the Asim Empire or an internal battle…

"Big Brother, you have to let me grow up," she tutted, but still let him squeeze her, "if you miss me that much, why don't you have a daughter."

Groaning, he kissed the top of her head and let her go.

"She's scared of me," he admitted bluntly, knowing this would be their last face-to-face conversation in a while.

Irini rolled her eyes and glanced over at her future sister-in-law, who happily chatted with the maid, Helena. She vaguely heard them discuss whether she was pregnant yet.

Her hand rested on her abdomen with a complex emotion. He had abandoned her last night and she still hadn't found him. Though she couldn't understand what the dragon wanted with her, the last thing she wanted with him was a child. Although a baby dragon... what would that look like?

She shook her head.

"You should just kiss her and get it over and done with, if you don't give me a niece within two years I'll disown you and find myself a new brother," where was the overly confident male lead that seduced the female lead?

"You try," he grumbled, "let's see what brother could put up with a sister like you."

"They don't need to put up with me, so long as they make Anise happy and gives me a niece, they'll be my brother," she stuck out her tongue.

A weird smile, that spread doom and gloom in her heart, appeared on her brother's face.

"You look cute," he teased, seeing her finally act like the little sisters he saw in other families. That beating in the palace a few weeks back was worth it. He no longer hated the dragon for stealing her away.

Ignoring him, she strode over to Anise, where she loudly mentioned that Anise was almost an adult now, and to be sure to tell her when she found someone worthy enough to be her brother-in-law.

Ares chuckled, likewise ignoring her childish behavior to go over the wagons for the fourth time.

"Where have you been?" With her hands behind her back, she approached the dragon hand feeding a smokey grey wyvern. 

"Busy," he replied, not even sparing her a look.

"Onyx, did I, did I say something wrong last night?" She asked, discretely placing herself between him and the female wyvern, attempting to secretly feed her one of the homemade jerky treats from her hand.

Onyx always got jealous when she fed them to the other beasts.

Seti, who had smelled the treat in her hand before he smelled her, snatched it before the wyvern could eat it and happily tossed it in his mouth.

When she glared at him, he gave her a smile that was not a smile, "I just fed her, you'll give her indigestion and she has a long way to carry you."

"Aren't we going by carriage?" She asked, turning to give the poor thing an apologetic look.

"I'm suddenly homesick, I want to get there faster," he lied. He did not want to give the assassins another chance to get her. Three nobles had died last night elsewhere. None of what was happening made sense to him or his brother at all.

He was a shield first, a sword second. He could leave all of that to his brother and his aides. His main priority was getting her home. When she was protected by his loyal vassals, only then he can rest easy.

It took an hour of listening to the droning nags of her brother, before she grew too impatient to put up with it. She actively reminded him of the crystal pendant on both of their necks, that he could use to communicate with her at any time, only then did he allowor her mount the wyvern.

The wagons of her things, alongside the carriages with the few maids who chose to go South, had already set off.

"Does she have a name?" Humans usually named everything, but she felt that beasts did not bother with such things.

Her husband was now a dragon instead of a man, stood towering beside them. Impatiently he flicked his tail, whilst shaking his head. As a dragon, he could not speak.

Excited, she placed a hand on the wyvern's neck, "Can I name you?"

The wyvern nodded their head. It was always like this with beasts, regardless of their level of sentience, they understood her perfectly well. However, to understand them, she had to rely on their body language.

"Isua, your scales are as beautiful as that crystal," she happily named the Wyvern that she assumed had been assigned to her.

It was not her first time flying, the dragon often took her. She lay against the wyvern below, her fingers trailing along the darker grey stripes of Isua's scales, thinking of such times. He seemed to always do it when she was sad.

Just why had the dragon picked her little pathetic human self as a wife?

Lost in her thoughts, she did not realize something was wrong until Isua suddenly dodged.

Onyx swiftly grabbed the large arrow that had aimed at her the weak human, not him the actual threat.

The large metal arrow snapped in two and dropped down below. After roaring he ducked lower as Isua raised higher above the clouds. 

They had not even left her brother's lands yet and they were attacked.

The biting cold of the higher atmosphere made Irini more breathless as she clutched the reigns with shivering gloved hands.

"Isua, will he be okay?"

The wyvern snorted like she asked something stupid, continuing to go southwards at a faster pace.

Below the clouds, Seti noticed the group of prepared assassins on the mountaintop.

Enraged, he breathed fire before thinking.

A short while later, Isua went below the clouds to another mountaintop, where four more wyverns waited with Zmeu knights atop them.

"Your Highness, were you injured?" The eldest of the four climbed off his wyvern to walk over to Isua who just landed. 

"No, no, I'm fine," Irini was in a daze. She was attacked again? That arrow was clearly aimed at her and even seemed to be from an artifact with course correction. There would have been no stopping it if she was alone. Even with a shield artifact, she would have at least broken her arm blocking it.

"Seti, he's alone and I think they have artifacts," she bit her lip, looking helplessly back, hoping to see the large lump of black in the blue sky.

She was used to being in battle, though usually only crude weapons were used, she'd faced such artifacts before. Yet back then she had acted fearlessly every time, knowing that that day was not the day she should die. 

Now, the day of her death had passed, she felt for the first time as Irini, she could die at any moment. She had never been truly fearless, she just trusted in the plot. Now that she corrupted the plot with her presence, it was no longer reliable. 

"Your Highness, drink this," one of the knights offered her a flask.

She took it, then sniffed it to smell its ingredients. The knight thankfully did not look offended as she confirmed that it was just water with a few herbs to promote health.

"Thank you," she felt a tad bit calmer after taking a long drink.

"Do you feel well enough to keep going your highness?" the older one who seemed to be in charge asked.

"What about Seti?" Her brain was working in overdrive, trying to go through the plot she seemed to barely remember.

It had been so long since she read it. She had been sixteen as Lily, now she was twenty as Irini.

When she became self-aware, she selfishly first only thought of herself in the plot. Then as her brother 'grew' on her, she would recall certain points about her brother's future without her.

She did not have a photogenic memory, she couldn't just take out her phone and look it up. The plot suddenly felt useless to her as she worried looking at the vast open sky.

"Prince Seti can handle a few assassins, your Highness, don't you recall the battle just last summer," as the knight spoke, she vaguely recalled seeing him around Onyx before.

Onyx had a very relaxed relationship with the knights, none of them feared him, instead they only looked at him with God-like awe.

"That's not what I'm worried about," she mumbled, then sighed wearily climbing back atop Isua.

It seemed she was the only one worried he would return with a new scar to his collection.