บท 21: A Royal Cousin
The academy staff who was responsible for healing the students tried to get close to the girl, when they noticed that they were a little bit late. Some other student had already picked up the girl and carried her over to them.
Like entering a snowstorm, the shorter the distance between them and the student, the colder it seemed to get, his aura raging like a wild animal.
"Who ... who are you?" One of the healers finally did his best to approach Aaron. He didn't dare to touch the girl in his arms and just led them to one of the many tents, which had a few beds as well as some magical gear inside.
Aaron did not answer, but after a while of silence the young girl in his arms did.
"He's my boyfriend." she mumbled quietly, still half asleep and not really fully awake, before focusing her energy on repairing her body again. Her sleep was interrupted by pain and the noises around her and her consciousness had a hard time deciding if she sould stay awake or just fall asleep again.
Aaron's facial expression changed from surprised to smug, to worried in a very short time.
Finally his worry won the expression battle on his face and he gently put Myra on one of the beds and gave the healer some room to take a look at her.
Focusing on his task, the healer soon noticed, that the girl in front of him must have already started some healing magic on her own, as her injuries recovered at a rapid pace. It did not take long for him to step back and just look at her in wonder, shaking his head. There was not really anything he could do to further improve the situation. Likely he would just spoil all the work her magic already did.
"What's wrong?" someone asked from the entrance of the tent.
"Principal!" the healer saw a few people entering the tent, one of them the principal of their academy.
When he noticed the people entering behind the principal, his face froze. Even without the decorations and ornaments he would recognize members of the royal family. It was also well known that the emperor's sister as well as her daughter were visiting the academy. The well-known general Jaros standing behind them did not exactly improve his mood either.
"Your highness, my lady, general" he quickly bowed down to show his respect before starting to explain the situation.
Aaron gave a quick bow, but did not even release Myra's hand, not letting her out of his eyes for even a moment.
"I guess the reason why you are here must be because you want to know of the girl's situation?" the healer carefully asked the question that seemed make the most sense. With the principal just nodding he continued.
"There is not much I can currently do … " he began to state his situation. When all the faces in front of him started to frown he felt a shiver running down his spine. "The girl already used her own magic to start the healing. I'm ashamed to say, but my own healing abilities are far inferior and would likely cause more harm than they would help her."
When the faces of the people surrounding him, still had that frown plastered on them, he quickly continued to explain. "She should be fine, just resting for a few days. With the speed her current healing magic progresses at, she will likely be back to normal in a few days, or a week at the most."
Finally there was some change visible on the faces of those important people in front of him. They visibly relaxed when he told them that she would be fine.
"Who are you young man?" the elderly person asked Aaron.
While Aaron might not know him in person, he was still a senior student of a military academy. It would be a joke if he couldn't even recognize one of their own military's generals, a man who was not only known for his strength at the level of a hierophant, but also his endless list of military achievements.
"I'm Aaron a student of this academy, general." he quickly answered, not sure where this question would lead them.
"I can see that you are a student." the general chuckled. He somehow reminded Aaron a lot more of a kind hearted old grandfather, rather than some military officer. "I ask because I want to know your relationship with her highness Myra."
For a moment Aaron considered what to say. His answer might very well cause a huge amount of trouble for himself. Getting close to royalty without the royal families permissions was a quick way to ruin one's future prospects.
"I'm her boyfriend." Aaron answered calmly after a moment. 'If Myra wants me to be her boyfriend, I won't deny it, even if it's a really stupid idea.' he thought to himself.
Jaros nodded after a while. "You seem to be from Luminos?" he further asked and when Aaron nodded he seemed to smile. "Well, as she is in no danger anymore, I guess I should go back and not bother you any further. I will take my leave." The general nodded to the principal, Aaron as well as the healer, gave a bow to the other members of the Aer family, before leaving the tent.
Soon after the principal was dragging the healer out as well, leaving just the royal family members and Aaron at Myra's side.
"The poor child. She must have suffered so much to save that other kid." Lady Velia suddenly said and went over to Myra.
"Mom, is she really my cousin?" the young woman asked a little skeptical. "She doesn't look like any of our relatives."
Lady Velia gave Aaron a look before sighing. "Obviously not child, but for now keep it to yourself, as should you, young man."
"She is royalty, but not from our family. From what I have been told, she is the heir of some strong empire far away, their royal family also seems to have a divine bloodline, but they are not directly related to us. While the common folk believe that everyone with the Aer name is part of our royal family, you know as well as I do, that it really is just because no one else in the neighboring empires has a divine bloodline."
This revelation surprised both the young princess as well as Aaron, but it also explained a lot of things to him that Myra didn't want to tell them.
"Why are we keeping everyone in the dark about her true origins then?"
"Oh child, not all families are in the same situations as we are. Our royal family's situation is really rare. We don't really have internal strife, there are no attempts to fight for the throne or for power and I'm proud to say that neither of my siblings, nor any of our children or grandchildren would do anything to harm each other."
"Basically it means there is no reason someone might want to harm her. In the eyes of some outsiders she would just be another child of our family. They think that while we would try to protect her, it wouldn't go as far as risking the empire's wellbeing for her, as we have quite a lot of other potential heirs."
"Now imagine what could happen if they were to realize that she is not just another of your cousins, but the crown princess of an empire powerful enough to go to war with us just with her older sister on her own. What might they do, if they realize that they could just kidnap the girl and use her to take over our lands?"
Lady Velia suddenly realized that they were not alone and giving Aaron yet another look she turned to her daughter.
"Now I hope you understand, why she's your cousin. At least for everyone else unrelated."
"I always wanted another cousin that's not half a century old!" the young woman said happily, before turning around to Aaron.
"I think we have not met before. I'm Lieutenant Evany Aer, or as you probably know by now, supposed to be Myra's cousin. As you are her boyfriend, I guess we should figure out how this is going to work."
Most other members of royalty would likely have used their title instead of their military rank in order to introduce themselves. Aaron thought it was rather interesting to meet this princess Evany, she really was as the rumors said, more focused on her military achievements than on being a pretty princess.
Feeling quite comfortable with the direct attitude of Evany that he was already used to from Myra, Aaron's frosty attitude became a little bit more relaxed. His aura toned down a lot and it no longer felt like he was a soldier surrounded by enemies.
"How are we going to make this work?" he asked them, having no idea what would be a proper process for becoming a royal princess' boyfriend.
"I don't really know." Evany replied with a frown. "Mom?"
"Don't worry about it. I will figure something out. For now as you are all students it should not be a big issue. Just don't cause any rumors that we would have to act on."
"Rumors? What kind of rumors?" Evany quickly asked, before Aaron could even reply.
"Well, you know the kind of rumors that I wish you would be causing at some point. Falling madly in love with some random pretty boy and ending up giving me a grandchild. You're soon turning twenty three and you don't even have a boyfriend, let alone a child. I should just marry you off to someone without even bothering to ask you for your opinion!"
"Oh mom, didn't we discuss this already? You know as well as I do, that it might take decades to get a child." Evany was sulking in front of her mother. The pair of mother and daughter seemed to totally ignore Aaron, while they argued and he wished he could turn himself invisible.
"Yes and the earlier you start the earlier we might see a cute little toddler and hear its laughter in our home!"
It did not take long for Evany to flee the scene and soon after her mother also left the tent. Aaron waited some hours before the healers finally told him that Myra should be stable enough and asked him to carry her back to her room. Obviously she ended up in Aaron's room instead. What proper boyfriend was he if he just left a hurt girl all on her own? No, he didn't consider that he could have asked Alyn to watch her.
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