Tapi sekarang?
Sekarang, Jesse mendapati dirinya merasa marah.
Secara diam-diam. Secara mendalam. Tanpa alasan yang masuk akal.
Bukan jenis kemarahan yang meluap-luap dan berteriak. Bukan, ini adalah jenis kemarahan yang membara di dalam dada—mengendap di perutnya seperti sesuatu yang basi dan tak diinginkan.
Ini bukan sekadar apa yang dikatakan oleh Valeria.
Melainkan apa arti dari ucapan itu.
Lucavion—Lucavion-nya, pria yang dulu pernah berdiri bersamanya di tengah lumpur dan darah serta memberinya keteguhan saat ia tak punya apa-apa lagi—Lucavion itu ternyata juga milik orang lain. Milik gadis ini. Patung bangsawan berambut merah muda ini. Warisan berjalan dari sebuah House yang telah hancur.
Jesse selalu menganggap dirinya sebagai pengecualian. Satu-satunya orang yang tidak terseret oleh teka-teki dan topeng pria itu, melainkan orang yang benar-benar melihat sosoknya. Bahkan jika ia tidak pernah mengucapkannya, bahkan jika ia tidak mampu merangkai kata-kata tentang apa arti Lucavion baginya—apa arti kehadiran itu, suara itu, senyum miring yang menyebalkan di tengah malam itu—semuanya adalah miliknya.
Bukankah begitu?
Dan sekarang, ia baru menyadari...
Tidak.
Tidak.
Pernah ada orang lain. Mungkin tidak banyak. Tapi mereka ada. Dan gadis ini?
Valeria Olarion bukan sekadar mengenalnya.
Ia telah melihat menembus kepribadian pria itu.
Pikiran itu berputar-putar di tenggorokan Jesse bagaikan pecahan kayu.
Pandangannya terangkat, mengamati wajah Valeria, menunggu sesuatu—apa saja—yang bisa memberinya izin untuk membenci gadis itu. Kedutan arogan. Tatapan penuh tahu. Secercah kebanggaan yang terselip di balik bulu matanya. Sesuatu yang bisa disambar oleh emosinya lalu dikuliti habis-habisan.
Namun kemudian—
Ia melihatnya.
Senyuman itu.
Bukan senyuman ala kaum ningrat. Bukan selubung keramahan yang dibuat-buat yang dikenakan Valeria bagaikan zirah sutra.
Senyuman kali ini adalah—
Murni.
Tanpa dibuat-buat.
Memancar.
Kilatan singkat cahaya matahari yang terukir di daging dan jiwa. Senyuman itu bahkan tidak ditujukan kepada siapa pun. Tidak dipamerkan. Tidak dipoles.
Senyuman itu sekadar ada.
Kehangatan yang berpendar, lembut dan tanpa usaha, di wajahnya saat ia mendengarkan seseorang berbicara—bukan Jesse, bahkan bukan para bangsawan. Hanya... seseorang. Sesuatu. Sebuah kenangan, mungkin.
Dan untuk sekejap detak jantung, Jesse lupa cara bernapas.
Karena pada saat itu, Valeria sama sekali tidak terlihat seperti seorang bangsawan.
Ia tidak terlihat seperti saingan.
Ia bahkan tidak terlihat seperti gadis yang memegang nama besar atau hak rahasia atas masa lalu Lucavion.
Ia terlihat manusiawi.
Dan cantik.
Bukan dengan cara yang elegan dan menjaga jarak seperti biasanya. Bukan seperti batu yang dipahat terlalu mulus untuk disentuh.
Melainkan cantik dengan cara perasaan itu sendiri menjadi indah.
Hidup.
Rentan.
Hal itu menghantam Jesse bagaikan hantaman benda tumpul—bagaimana seseorang yang begitu tenang, yang begitu terkontrol secara dingin, bisa menyimpan sesuatu yang begitu lembut di dalam dirinya.
Dan yang lebih buruk—bagaimana kelembutan itu jelas-jelas pernah disentuh oleh Lucavion.
Pria itu membuatnya tersenyum seperti itu.
Bukan karena ia berusaha melakukannya. Bukan karena ia merayunya.
Melainkan karena sesuatu tentang dirinya berhasil menyentuhnya. Mencapai sudut mana pun di balik fasad sempurna itu yang masih berdetak seperti hati seorang gadis alih-alih kewajiban seorang duchess.
Jesse mengalihkan pandangannya.
Tiba-tiba udara terasa kembali menyesakkan.
Kehangatan ruangan itu. Tawa itu. Musik yang merayap di balik gelas dan perak—semuanya meredup.
Karena bahkan jika ia tidak mau mengakuinya dengan suara lantang...
Sebagian dari dirinya membenci gagasan bahwa orang lain telah lebih dulu mencapai Lucavion sebelum dirinya.
Bukan sekadar mengenalnya.
Tetapi dikenal olehnya.
Namun—
Senyuman itu.
Senyuman itu tertinggal di balik kelopak matanya, seolah mengolok-oloknya.
Tidak.
Tidak mengolok-olok.
Hanya... ada.
Hal ini—
Hal ini jauh lebih buruk.
Karena Jesse tidak bisa lagi merasa marah.
Tidak benar-benar marah.
Tidak ketika ia menatap mata Valeria dan melihat... tidak ada apa pun selain kebenaran. Tanpa intrik. Tanpa akting. Tanpa kepuasan terselubung karena telah merampas sesuatu yang tadinya disangka Jesse adalah miliknya.
Tidak ada arogansi.
Tidak ada kemenangan terselubung.
Bahkan tidak ada rasa mementingkan diri sendiri ala Arcanis yang membungkus begitu banyak bangsawan bagaikan kulit kedua.
Hanya... kenangan.
Kenangan dan senyuman yang nyata.
Sungguh tak tertahankan.
Dan itu sangat jujur.
But now?
Now, Jesse found herself angry .
Quietly. Deeply. Unreasonably.
Not the kind of anger that boiled over and screamed. No, this was the kind that simmered low—settling in her gut like something curdled and unwanted.
It wasn’t just what Valeria said.
It was what it meant .
Lucavion— her Lucavion, the one who had once stood beside her in the mud and blood and given her grit when she’d had none left—that Lucavion had been someone else’s too. To this girl . This pink-haired statue of nobility. This walking heirloom of a ruined House.
Jesse had always thought herself the exception. The one person who hadn’t been swept away by his riddles and masks, but who saw him . Even if she never voiced it, even if she couldn’t articulate what Lucavion meant to her—what that presence, that voice, that infuriating smirk in the dead of night meant—it had been hers .
Hadn’t it?
And now, she was realizing...
No.
No.
There had been others. Maybe not many. But they existed . And this one?
Valeria Olarion hadn’t just known him.
She’d seen beneath him.
The thought twisted in Jesse’s throat like splinters.
Her gaze lifted, searching Valeria’s face, waiting for something— anything —to give her permission to despise her. A smug twitch. A knowing look. A glint of pride tucked beneath her lashes. Something Jesse could seize with her temper and flay it clean.
But then—
She saw it.
The smile.
Not the court one. Not the carefully constructed veil of civility Valeria wore like silk armor.
This one was—
Pure.
Unpracticed.
Radiant.
A brief flicker of sunlight carved into flesh and soul. It wasn’t even directed at anyone. It wasn’t performed. It wasn’t polished.
It simply was .
A warmth that glowed, gently and without effort, across her face as she listened to someone speak—not Jesse, not even the nobles. Just... someone . Something. A memory, perhaps.
And for a heartbeat, Jesse forgot to breathe.
Because Valeria, in that moment, didn’t look like a noble.
She didn’t look like a rival.
She didn’t even look like a girl who held a powerful name or some secret claim on Lucavion’s past.
She looked human .
And beautiful .
Not in the elegant, distant way she usually was. Not like stone carved too smooth to touch.
But beautiful the way feelings are beautiful.
Alive.
Vulnerable.
It hit Jesse like a blunt force—how someone so composed, so icily controlled, could carry something so soft inside her.
And worse—how that softness had clearly been touched by Lucavion.
He made her smile like that.
Not because he tried to. Not because he wooed her.
But because something about him moved her. Reached whatever place inside that perfect façade still beat like a girl’s heart instead of a duchess’s duty.
Jesse looked away.
Suddenly the air felt too tight again.
The warmth of the room. The laughter. The music threading beneath glass and silver—it all dulled.
Because even if she wouldn’t admit it out loud...
Some part of her hated the idea that someone else had reached Lucavion before her.
Not just known him.
But been known by him.
And yet—
That smile.
It lingered behind her eyes, mocking her.
No.
Not mocking.
Just... existing.
This—
This was worse.
Because Jesse couldn’t be angry anymore.
Not really.
Not when she looked into Valeria’s eyes and saw... nothing but truth. No schemes. No performance. No quiet satisfaction in stealing something Jesse had thought was hers.
There was no smugness.
No veiled triumph.
Not even that polished Arcanis self-importance that wrapped so many nobles like a second skin.
Just... memory.
Memory and a smile that was real .
It was unbearable.
And it was honest.
"Beautiful..." Cali’s voice drifted beside her, soft and startled—as if the word had escaped without permission.
Several heads turned. A few others—Arcanis and Lorian alike—nodded, almost reverently.
"Truly..." murmured a girl with snow-pinned hair. "Like something out of a painting."
"That smile just now..." another added, "I didn’t think she could..."
"She looked... warm," someone whispered. "I didn’t know she could look warm."
Jesse didn’t respond.
Couldn’t.
Because she felt it too.
That fleeting glow, that almost-sacred contradiction, was burned into her sight now. The girl who had stood like marble beside them moments ago—regal, untouchable, perfect in poise—had, for a single heartbeat, cracked open.
And what shone through...
was human .
Valeria’s expression was shifting back now—shoulders drawing subtly upright again, lashes lowering, mouth evening into that soft, courteous line. But the damage had been done. The image lingered.
And Jesse hated that it moved her.
"Lady Olarion," one of the boys asked suddenly, with the cautious politeness people reserved for royalty and spirits, "After Andelheim... did you ever see him again?"
The room stilled again—quiet, but attentive.
Valeria’s head turned slightly, the soft pink of her hair catching in the chandelier light like dawn through frost. She met the question with a pause. Not theatrical. Not heavy. Just... honest.
"No."
She shook her head gently.
"I never heard from him again. Not until today."
The words weren’t sad. They weren’t bitter.
They were... resigned.
But there—
in those simple words, Jesse heard something.
Not sadness.
Not regret.
But a quiet truth that echoed too close to her own.
I never heard from him again.
Valeria had meant it plainly. But Jesse... she heard more.
She heard the same silence Lucavion left behind in her .
The same gaps between what he said and what he never would.
The same vanishing act that wasn’t cruel—but was him.
If he’s like this to everyone...
That thought stung at first. Like she’d been tricked into believing she was different.
But now, standing here, watching a girl like Valeria—so composed, so sharp, so hauntingly real—say it without bitterness...
She could feel the tension in her chest begin to loosen.
Not disappear.
But loosen.
Maybe...
maybe she could forgive him.
Just a little.
Forgive him for the way he left.
For the way he appeared again without explanation.
For being who he was—so completely, so unapologetically—that people like them kept trying to fill in the blanks he left behind.
Someone in the group chuckled, drawing Jesse’s attention back.
"Do you remember when he dropped Rowen mid-swing with a backhand movement of sword ? Didn’t even break stance."
"Oh, he toyed with Rowen," someone else said.
Cali snorted. "That’s generous. Rowen’s avoiding mirrors."
Laughter followed. Light. Easy.
Jesse found herself smiling. Not wide. But real.
This was... fine. This conversation. This strange shared mythology around Lucavion.
They were building it together, piece by piece.
And maybe that was okay.
But then—
"Hello."
The voice came like silk pulled through wine.
Soft.
Smooth.
Unhurried.
And every person in the circle—Lorian, Arcanis, noble or soldier—turned at once.
"Would you mind," the voice continued, each word dipped in subtle grace,
"if I were to join?"
Lavender eyes.
Silky platinum hair.
Isolde.
Her presence did not demand attention—it gathered it. Like a storm cloud that hadn’t rumbled yet, but could .
She moved slowly into the circle, not like someone requesting permission, but like someone offering the illusion of it.
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