Valkom rounded the corner of the room Onixe pulled Nikase into much later in the evening, when the energy of the night fought off death as if it were half-hoping death would take it. A few folks were determined to make it through until the next morning, despite the majority of the crowd dissipating around the midnight hour. 

The Bevij prince had watched Deitrut Nikome begrudgingly fight off exhaustion in a chair across the hall for thirty minutes, until he gave in and got up to look for his sisters. He might’ve assumed they left home for the night, as he stomped past the corner room twice before making for the exit. 

In the corner room he found Lior, Onixe, Nikase and another woman surrounded by a number of cased and uncase instruments. He hadn’t even noticed when he lost track of Lior. 

The redhead and Onixe were collapsed on a divan, laughing in their own world. Nikase sat close to the woman sitting at the pianoforte, strumming at a harp with no direction. They were talking among themselves, quieting when he approached. 

The woman at the piano rose and gave him a half bow, “Your Excellence.” 

Valkom waved away the gesture, “It’s too far late in the evening for anyone to care about formalities.”

The raven haired beauty’s laugh was light and courteous. “All the same, I must take my leave.” Her eyes darted over to where Lior and Onixe were sitting. “Good night all.” 

Once she made her exit, Nikase explained that she was unmarried. 

One of Dofev’s bizarre customs dictated that the unwed woman could not socialize with married men who were not directly related. There were exceptions for visitors like Lior, and in Nikase’s case, she was widowed and still counted as ‘married’.

Although, if their time in Dofev had proven anything was that not everyone thought she should be an exception to that rule. Maybe that wasn’t the issue. The issue was Valkom. 

He took a seat on the edge of the piano bench and tried to lean back on it, finding it too short to do it comfortably. He solved the problem by propping his legs on the back of a nearby chair. 

Lady Nikase watched him silently, keeping her judgments to herself. 

She was a difficult character to read. He could only guess at her intentions with 60% accuracy. At times her sense of humor was dark and other times she was candid and kind with her words. 

“If you want to dance now, I’d be up for it.”

It took her saying that for him to notice that Lior and Onixe had snuck off once again. Liorit was wasting no time in moving on from that girl she’d traveled with. Good for her. 

“I don’t want to dance with you right now,” he said, with the weight of the evening sitting on his chest.  “I would like you to hear you play something.”

Her expression was lost in the light and poor angle. “What would you like to hear? I only know a few songs in their entirety. But I know parts of many.”

“Right, it’s not often you play an entire orchestra.” He closed his eyes, “play your favorite, then.”

The strings of the harp produced a sound that reminded him of water drops, and in the song she played he felt the drops were dripping in uneven clusters, off the incline of a roof, dribbling past the window he painted in his mind. The scene shifted with the song. When it turned into a romantic dance between two characters pulling and pushing away from each other, he knew he was putting too much of himself into the mental image. He sat up on the bench and turned to her. 

“When I said I didn’t want to dance with you, I meant that unlike your brother, I think dancing out there, in front of others, is less dangerous than dancing here, without any supervision. I don’t trust myself not to say something stupid.”

She kept her focus on her instrument, her strumming uninterrupted. “Like?” she asked. 

“When I say stupid, I don't mean the idea itself is stupid,” he explained. “ Nor do I think the idea of you stupid. I’m stupid for telling you that I like you when I shouldn’t.”

Her playing stopped. He was on the wrong side of 60%, her expression told him nothing. 

He wanted to clarify so he went on, digging himself a deeper grave, “This isn’t a declaration of love, or me announcing my intention to spend more time with you. I enjoy talking to you, and I’d hope you’d tell me if that wasn’t mutual, only I find myself saying too much around you, and I think it’s a sign of something.”

“...something?”

“Something that frightens me.” He walked that back immediately. “You don’t frighten me. Sorry—that sounds bad—what I mean is it's impossible for me to face reality around you and I…”

“Don’t want to face reality…” 

 “No, I don’t.”

Her expression was direct, and had yet to change during the whole exchange. Perhaps that is why he was so willing to divulge information around her. A need to fill the silence. 

No—there was another reason for that. Nikase was genuine… Valkom wanted her to like him… not even necessarily romantically, either. If she believed him to be a decent person, then there was a chance… that he would one day believe it. That he was worthy. 

“Do you want to know the truth?”

He glanced to the open doorway, the muffled noises of the celebration downstairs stirred. But her sister and Lior were nowhere to be seen. 

“I do and I don’t.” He confessed, shoving his unease aside. 

“I enjoy talking to you as well.” Her large green eyes softened. ”It also helps me avoid facing reality. I can’t judge you for not wanting to when I’m doing the same. But I also fear…” Her head tilted and she pressed her lips. “You’re closer to reality than I… and I’m afraid you’ll find it and I will be alone again.” 

“Let’s promise to not to, then. Together. We will avoid reality as long as we are able to.”

She let out a soft, attractive, laugh in surprise. “We can’t promise that. There is a difference between bittersweet company and holding onto one another as clutches.” 

That struck a chord. 

“Nikase?” The piano bench creaked as he rose to his feet. 

Her gaze followed him. “Yes?” 

“Years from now, when we’re both old and worn, would you rather think back to this moment and wonder what could’ve been, or think fondly of something that started and ended here?”  The heir to the throne of Bevij extended his hand. 

She stared at his hand, unfocusing and refocusing on his face. “Something that started and ended here.”

The gentle way she took his hand was sobering. It was as if he were walking into the world from an illusion of his own making, and he wondered what an ideal world would look like to him. He’d never let himself speculate, in doing so he spared himself disappointment. Why is that he always fascinated himself what he could not have?

Whatever song was playing outside was lost to his ears, so he navigated them away from the light of the windows and in search of the shadows of the room. If someone were to happen upon them, it was for the best.

The edges of the song in the background implied it was a folk song, a slower one typically accompanied by belted vocals. The lyricist was long gone, however, resulting in the instrumental variation. 

As so, they eased into a slower folk dance, Nikase following his lead. 

He’d noticed her observing him similarly earlier in the night. And he wondered if he managed to impress her with his knowledge of Dofec dances. A limited knowledge, in his opinion, but it had always been easy for him to pick up what others were doing in the moment. And what he lacked in skill, he made up for in confidence. 

He actually didn’t know how to break it to her. That he always took a greater interest in the dances over the music. 

“What is music to you? You said it was your first love, what does that look like?” he asked her mid-dance.

The corners of her mouth twitched into an unlikely smile. “When you listen to a song that is new to you… do you assume the beat, guess at the rhythm, or are you at the mercy of the song?”

“I suppose the last one.”

“I experience all of those things at once. Beyond that, I want nothing else in the world to exist at that moment in time, only the song, the movements, and I.” Her words were guarded. “I don’t care if the world around me is real, what awaits me in the afterlife or if people around me are true or fake, because music is real, and I’ll never question the way it feels towards me. Well that's a lie, that is what I question now I suppose.”

“Tell me why.”

She squinted in thought, her eyelashes casting a thin shadow under her eyes.  “When you play a song for an audience, the song stops existing the moment you stop playing it, right?”

“Unless you are recording it.”

“Unless you record it,” she nodded. “Although, there’s a magic that gets lost through recording. Aside from that, fragments of it can live on in the memories of the people who were there to experience it.”

Valkom nodded in agreement. 

“I had this idea, when I made memories in the past, that a good memory would be good forever.” She gave his left hand a gentle squeeze. “And now… I’m disillusioned with the music in those memories. To play those songs now, I have to be somewhere else mentally, It doesn’t feel right. You can’t do that with music… you have to be present, or it punishes you.”

“Is music punishing you, or are you punishing you?”

She smiled offhandedly, and glanced away. “I thought we weren’t facing reality here, Val.” 

“My apologies, you are absolutely correct.” 

They continued their dance in that stagnant near-silence they’d found comfort in. Probably because they were both living so far removed from the present and all its physical offerings. Furthermore, it was too late in the evening for the short burst of adrenaline that had gotten Valkom to this point. Nikase didn’t look the slightest bit tired. She’d always been clean and collected, subtle with her choices and over all put together.

It was surprising to hear that she too avoided her reality. Although, with everything she had gone through, she had every right to. Unlike Valkom who had no reason other than having no desire to play his part. 

“It’s late, I should go,” she said when their dance concluded. 

He nodded and helped her collect her things. “You leave first,” he said, hoping the coast was clear of anyone who would remember seeing them exiting the same room minutes apart. 

“It’s alright, I’ll exit this way.” She pointed to a door in the corner that she seemed to recognize as an alternate exit. She’d likely performed here previously.

“Have a good evening, Nika.” 

She stopped and doubled back. “Val?”

“Yes?”

“Earlier you said ‘something that started and ended here’, right?”

That sounded like something he would say, despite not knowing what he fully meant by it. He’d been talking too much. “I did.”

She dropped her right hand on his shoulder, swiftly leaning up and kissing him. A, short, sweet finality to their evening. 

“Good evening.”