Chapter 372: Shameless
In the shower, Stan tipped his head back under the rainhead and let three days of Antarctic ice and werewolf blood and Void Sovereign trials and civilian bodies on frozen roads and the small tight quaver in the voice of everyone he had called from the sedan simply, for a moment, run off him.
The water was very hot. The steam rose slowly around him and gathered against the frameless glass.
He stood under it for a long minute without moving.
Somewhere, halfway through, an unwelcome thought surfaced.
Camilla had, at one point right before he gave her that mission to destroy all toys, casually mentioned observing the entirety of the military base through her spirit sense, as if she were flipping through the pages of a large-format book.
She had catalogued the location of the scientific outpost. Without breaking eye contact with him, she had once described the layout of a coastal town three hundred kilometers away.
A woman capable of that was capable, if she chose, of observing a bathroom through a wall.
Stan considered this, briefly, under the hot water.
Then he shrugged.
Camilla Dragomir was, whatever else she was, a stiff-spined Royal Blood with several years of ingrained aristocratic decorum layered under the Old-World predator instincts. The version of her that had beheaded Elder Fang and destroyed a military base’s equipment was real.
So was the version of her that had inclined her head with the small precise dignity of a woman who considered "not being caught looking" to be one of the fundamental disciplines of adulthood.
She would not. He was reasonably sure she would not. But if she did there was nothing he could do about it.
He turned his face up into the water and stopped thinking about it.
He came out of the bathroom fifteen minutes later in loose dark drawstring trousers and no shirt, running a towel through his hair, the steam rolling out around him in a slow warm exhale.
Camilla was standing at the glass. She turned her head when he entered.
Her red eyes went, very briefly, to the line of his shoulders. To the clean sharp line of his chest. To the small tightness of his stomach. To the small dark strand of wet hair that had fallen across his forehead and had not yet been pushed back.
Her expression did not change. Her eyes were, however, definitely there for one full beat longer than she had intended.
Then she looked, very deliberately, back at the sea.
"Bathroom’s yours whenever you want it," Stan said, matter-of-fact, still working the towel through his hair. "Second door on the left down that hall. Everything works the way it looks like it works. Towels in the cabinet under the sink. If anything confuses you, ask."
"...Thank you, human."
She continued to look at the view from the balcony.
He hung the towel around his neck and turned to survey the bedroom.
He stopped.
Because in the middle of his bedroom, his bedroom, which he had left entering the bathroom featuring one large low bed and one accent chair and precisely no cultivator artifacts, there was now, hovering approximately three feet above the floor, a bed.
Sort of.
It was a broad rectangular slab of pale green stone, roughly the dimensions of a very generous double bed, its surface polished to a soft satiny sheen and its edges carved in the small clean geometric patterns that Stan had, by now, begun to associate with the Void Sovereign’s aesthetic.
It floated, silent and level, in the middle of the room. It cast no shadow. The air beneath it was, when Stan reflexively passed a hand through the space, entirely undisturbed.
He stared at it with a bit of surprise.
Behind him, Camilla, who had followed him into the bedroom with the quiet trailing curiosity of a woman who had decided her tour was starting now whether Stan had officially announced it or not, glanced at the platform, glanced at his face, and produced a small quiet smirk.
"You look surprised, cultivator."
"Well I’m surprised..." Stan looked at her. Obviously Camilla must’ve placed it there while he was bathing.
Her red eyes were bright with the small private amusement of a woman who had, at some point in the past ten minutes, done something and was now enjoying herself.
"What sort of bed is that, a levitating bed, you Cultivators have interesting stuffs of your own..."
"Hmmph~" Camilla smiled slightly.
Seeing her enjoy the praise a bit, Stan’s lip raised as he added, "In the end it’s just stone..."
Camilla felt as though she had been slapped on the face upon hearing that.
"That’s where you’re wrong," saying that she stepped past him toward the platform. She ran one long pale finger along the polished edge. The stone hummed, faintly, at the contact, a low steady note somewhere at the edge of the audible.
"While it looks like stone, it’s very soft and comfortable, not only that it has the effect of calming the mind..." She glanced at him and continued.
"It’s not your normal jade," she said, without turning around. "Grown, not carved. Aligned to the flow of vital Qi. Cool in summer, warm in winter. Provides passive circulation of Qi to the occupant while they rest. In my family it was considered the minimum acceptable furnishing for a Royal Blood in transit."
"Uh-huh."
"I have used it for a very long time."
"Uh-huh."
Stan nodded solemnly as though he were listening to a priceless lecture on ancient cultivator treasures while mentally concluding that it was, nevertheless, still a floating rock.
She turned to face him. The small smirk was still there as she signaled at his bed that was right beside her jade bed.
"Well you didn’t think I’ll have a bed with me right? Did you assume, cultivator, that we are going to share that?"
Stan raised both eyebrows. He considered several possible responses. He selected the most honest one.
"It’s not that unusual for comrades to share a bed."
Camilla’s eyes widened, unable to tell if this was one of his jokes or if he was going at it.
"That is the word you are going with." She asked calmly.
"Yes." Stan smiled, barely holding his laughter in.
Her red eyes glittered, finally concluding he was joking from that laugh. "You are shameless, human."
"I’ve been told."