Chapter 218. Laughter Was a Foreign Language She’d Only Ever Heard Described
As the main course was cleared, the kitchen didn’t grow cold; instead, it seemed to heat up with a different kind of energy.
Catherine, clearly sensing that the formal barriers were beginning to crack, decided to double down on her mission of hospitality.
She began producing more food, small bowls of honey-glazed nuts, a cheese board that looked like something out of a painting, and a rich, chocolatey dessert that she produced almost as if by magic.
"Now, Lia, I need to know for future reference," Catherine said, leaning forward with an exaggerated seriousness as she drizzled honey over a plate of fruit. "This dinner is a start, but what is your actual weakness?"
"If you were stranded on a desert island and could only have one meal for the rest of your life, what would it be?"
Lia blinked, the question clearly catching her off guard. She looked at Catherine as if she had just asked her to calculate the trajectory of a falling star.
"My... weakness?" she repeated, the word sounding foreign on her tongue. "I don’t understand..."
"Food is fuel. Survival requires nutrients, not... preferences."
William snorted, earning a sharp elbow from Catherine. "See, that’s your problem, Lia."
"You’re thinking like a soldier, but once in a while... you also need to think like a human who enjoys living." He grabbed a piece of bread and pointed it at her. "For instance, my weakness is anything that involves excessive amounts of butter and zero self-control."
Lia stared at him, her dark eyes tracking the movement of the bread. "That sounds... inefficient. And potentially dangerous for your cardiovascular health."
"See!" William grinned, leaning back. "She’s already analyzing my diet!"
"We’re doomed, Catherine. We’ve invited a tactical nutritionist into our home."
Catherine laughed, a bright, genuine sound that seemed to bounce off the walls. "Ignore him... He’s a lost cause."
She turned back to Lia, her expression softening. "But seriously, Lia. Is there anything you hate?"
"Anything that makes you think, ’I’d rather face a legion of demons than eat this’?"
Lia hesitated. She looked down at her plate, then back at Catherine.
"I... I dislike bitter herbs. And anything that is cold, but not temperature-cold, but... food that has been left out too long... like some kind of food that has lost its purpose."
"Food that lost its purpose?" William asked, his voice losing some of its playful edge.
Lia didn’t seem to notice the shift in his tone. "When food is served as a reminder of what you cannot have or as a punishment for what you failed to do."
"That is what I dislike."
A heavy silence descended for a heartbeat too heavy and too pointed. William felt a lump form in his throat, his mind racing to the images of Lia’s past, the cold dormitories, and the controlled rations. He wanted to reach across the table, to say something profound, but he knew that would only push her back into her shell.
Instead, he broke the tension with a poorly timed but necessary attempt at levity. "Well, in that case, you’ll love Catherine’s cooking."
"Her only real crime is adding way too much garlic... I think she’s trying to ward off vampires."
Catherine feigned offense, clutching her chest. "I’ll have you know, garlic is a medicinal herb, William."
"And it’s delicious." She turned to Lia with a conspiratorial wink. "Though, if you ever find yourself unable to speak because of the garlic fumes, just know it’s a sign of a job well done."
Lia’s lips didn’t quite form a smile, but the corners of her mouth twitched a tiny, almost invisible movement that was more significant than any grand gesture. "I will... keep that in mind."
"What about sweets?" Catherine pressed, unwilling to let the moment slip away. "Are you a chocolate person, or more of a fruit person?"
"I have never given it much thought," Lia admitted. "But... I remember once, when I was very young, before the academy..."
She trailed off, her gaze distant. "There was a pastry... sweet, with cream inside. I don’t remember the name. But it was warm."
"Warm cream pastries," William said softly, catching the thread. "That’s a solid choice."
"We’ll have to find you the best ones in the city."
"We will," Catherine promised fiercely. "We’ll hunt them down like enemy combatants."
Lia looked between them, William’s easy grin and Catherine’s fierce protectiveness. She looked at the table laden with food, the remnants of a meal that had been prepared not as a reward or a punishment but as an offering of care.
For a moment, the training grounds, the looming threats of Seraphina, and the brutal reality of their lives felt impossibly far away.
In this small, amber-lit room, surrounded by the scent of rosemary and chocolate, Lia wasn’t a weapon. She was just a young woman sitting at a table with people who wanted her to be full, warm, and safe.
She took another bite of the bread, this time slower, more deliberate.
"It is..." she started, then paused, searching for a word that didn’t belong in a military report. "...it is very good."
"Thank you."
...
While Lia sat at the table, the kitchen became a stage where William and Catherine performed a familiar, intimate dance. They moved around each other without needing to speak, a choreography born of shared history and affection.
William reached for a spice jar just as Catherine shifted to grab a serving platter, their shoulders brushing briefly, a contact so casual, so unguarded, that it seemed to radiate a kind of heat that had nothing to do with the stove.
"William, if you put any more rosemary in that reduction, we won’t be eating dinner; we’ll be eating a shrub," Catherine teased, though she was already reaching for the herb sprigs to add them herself.
"It’s called seasoning, Catherine. You should try it sometime instead of drowning everything in butter," William shot back with a grin, dodging a playful swat from her as he poured two glasses of wine.
Their laughter rose together, genuine, unforced sounds that filled the gaps between the clinking of silverware and the crackling of the hearth.
To anyone else, it was simply the sound of two people in love, comfortable in their own skin. But to Lia, watching from the periphery, those sounds felt like physical blows.
’Laughter.’
The word echoed in her mind like a foreign language she had heard described but never spoken. She watched the way Catherine leaned into William’s space and the way he looked at her not as a potential threat or a tactical asset but as something precious.
Her mind involuntarily retreated, the amber light of the kitchen fading into the cold, grey memory of her childhood home.
In her memories, silence wasn’t peaceful; it was mandatory. Laughter was considered a weakness, a crack in the armor that invited vulnerability.
She remembered the dining halls of her past long, echoing chambers where the only sound was the scrape of metal on stone and the rhythmic breathing of children who had learned early on that to be noticed was to be punished.
Food had never been a shared experience; it had been a transaction of obedience. A ration given for compliance, or withheld as a reminder of failure.
There had been no warmth, no shared jokes about garlic, no conspiratorial winks. Just the cold reality of survival.
A sharp pang of something she couldn’t name, something that felt dangerously like grief, twisted in her chest. It was a hollow ache, a wound that no amount of training could cauterize.
She felt exposed, not by a blade, but by the sheer normalcy of the scene before her. The kindness being offered was more terrifying than any threat Seraphina could pose, because it demanded something she wasn’t sure she knew how to give: vulnerability.
Desperate to ground herself, Lia lowered her gaze to the plate in front of her. She focused on the piece of bread she had been holding.
It was different. That was the only way she could articulate it.
The bread she was eating now was warm, its crust yielding with a soft crackle, the interior airy and infused with the faint sweetness of yeast and honey.
The bread from her past had been dense, tasteless, and often stale something designed to fill the stomach without nourishing the soul.
This bread felt like... an indulgence. An unnecessary kindness.
She tore off a small piece, her fingers trembling almost imperceptibly. She chewed slowly, deliberately, trying to process the texture, the warmth, the simple fact that she was allowed to enjoy it.
Each swallow felt heavy, as if she were consuming something far more potent than flour and water.
"Lia?"
William’s voice broke through the fog of her memory. He wasn’t looking at her with pity; he was too perceptive for that, but there was a quiet concern in his eyes, a readiness to step back if she needed space.
Lia looked up, forcing her expression to smooth back into its usual impassive mask, though she knew her eyes might betray her.
"I am fine," she said, her voice steadier than she felt. "The bread is... exceptional."
Catherine smiled, that warm, knowing smile that seemed to see through the steel. "Good. Because I’m not letting you leave until you’ve had at least two helpings of everything."