I Became the Villain Alpha's Omega (BL)-Chapter 28: The Little Experiment

Cherion jumped back, yelping like a startled cat. His heart, already doing a frantic percussion against his ribs from the "clinical study" of those shirtless sodliers, practically lodged itself in his windpipe.

Beside the hulking frame of the Duke, Soren appeared like a shadow manifesting out of the mountain mist. The aide offered a perfectly angled bow, but. Zarius didn’t even look at him. He merely lifted his hand, and Soren drifted backward several paces.

Zarius turned his full attention back to Cherion. He looked entirely too unimpressed, his red eyes harboring a dark, simmering irritation.

"I... uh... Good morning, Your Grace," Cherion stammered.

Zarius didn’t bother with the pleasantries. He didn’t even wish him a good morning back. "We return to the previous topic, then. So? Having fun ogling at my soldiers?"

"Your Grace," Cherion began, his spine stiffening as he tried to claw back some dignity, "I have eyes and it is their primary function to see, and I intend to use them to look at whatever I please."

Zarius’s jaw tightened, a small, dangerous twitch of muscle. He clearly wasn’t used to having his own logic thrown back in his face, especially by a "little Omega" who looked like he’d just crawled out of a laundry basket.

"And what," Cherion added, trying to sound bolder than he felt, "are you doing out here anyway? Shouldn’t you be resting?"

"I cannot grant myself the luxury of constant sloth," Zarius rumbled, looking at the sparring men like a king surveying his chess pieces. "There is work to be done. Part of that work involves ensuring my men haven’t turned soft in my absence. Now, answer the question. What brings you here if not the view?"

Cherion huffed, crossing his arms. "I didn’t come here to just stare. I mean... I didn’t come here to stare. I came to practice."

Zarius cut a sideways glance at him. "Practice?"

"My magic," Cherion corrected sharply. "I need subjects. Real, living, breathing subjects to test my healing magic. I figured in a place where people hit each other with sharpened iron, I might find a volunteer or two."

Zarius looked skeptical, but he didn’t stop Cherion when the boy turned and marched toward the training circle. If anything, the Duke followed.

As they approached the main ring, the sounds of clashing steel died down. Elio offered a respectful bow upon seeing them. Cherion didn’t wait for an introduction. He kept a bright, determined smile on his face, though his eyes were darting around.

Aha. There. Standing near the weapon rack was a younger soldier, perhaps twenty, with a grubby linen bandage wrapped sloppily around his bicep. Cherion walked toward him like a heat-seeking missile.

"Hello, fine soldier. "What happened to your arm?" Cherion asked while pointing at it.

The soldier straightened up so fast he nearly dropped his spear. "Lord Cherion! Uh, it’s nothing, my lord. Just a scratch from a practice blade. It caught me during the drills. It’s fine, really."

"May I see it? Can you please open the bandage?"

The soldier looked past Cherion to Zarius, who was looming behind the healer like a dark thundercloud. Zarius gave a nod. Hesitantly, the soldier unwound the linen. The wound wasn’t that deep, pretty new.

Cherion didn’t hesitate. He rolled up his own silk sleeves, exposing his pale wrists to the biting air. He took the soldier’s arm in his hands.

Cherion closed his eyes and reached for that internal spark. Come on, come out, you magic light. A soft, shimmering light began to pulse from his palms. It wasn’t a blinding flash, but a warm, honey-thick glow that smelled faintly of ozone and spring rain. Under his touch, the jagged edges of the cut began to crawl toward each other. The skin knit together, the redness faded, and in a matter of seconds, the injury vanished.

The silence in the training ground was absolute.

"Holy Mother," someone whispered.

The young soldier stared at his arm, flexing his bicep in disbelief. "It’s... it’s gone. It doesn’t even sting." He looked up at Cherion, his eyes wide with a new kind of respect. "Thank you, Lord Cherion. Truly."

"Wow," another soldier called out from the back, leaning on his shield. "Lord Cherion, I didn’t know you had the healing ability!"

The atmosphere flipped from "wow, impressive" to "oh great, here comes the chaos" in about half a second.

"His Grace is a lucky man!" a burly man laughed, elbowing his neighbor. "To have a fiancé who can patch him up and look that good doing it? I’d take a few more scars for a hand like that."

"Fight harder, lads!" The other roared, a mischievous glint in his eye. "We need to put on a proper show for the beautiful Lord Cherion! Don’t let him see you swinging like milkmaids!"

The teasing rippled through the ranks. They were laughing, throwing suggestive grins and making quips about Zarius finally finding a "match" that didn’t involve a sword.

Zarius, however, did not find it funny.

The laughter died in throats as a frost-crackle seemed to emanate from the Duke’s very shadow. He narrowed his eyes, his pupils turning into thin, red slits.

"Since you all have enough breath to gossip like old hens," Zarius barked, "it is clear you aren’t training hard enough. Your endurance is a disgrace. Thirty laps. Around the outer perimeter. Now."

A collective groan went up from the men.

"Fine. Forty."

The soldiers didn’t wait for fifty. They scrambled, throwing their practice weapons aside and sprinting toward the track as if the devil himself were snapping at their heels. Cherion stood there, watching the sudden exodus of shirtless men, and couldn’t help it, he giggled. He looked up at Zarius, who was still scowling at the retreating backs of his army.

"You look a little grumpy, you know," Cherion teased, poking the Duke’s armored arm. "A bit sensitive about the ’beautiful’ comments, are we?"

Zarius looked down at him, his face a mask of brooding stone. "Those guys are hopeless. And you are a distraction. We’re leaving."

Cherion just smiled, feeling a strange, bubbly sense of victory. He didn’t notice the way Zarius’s hand twitched, as if wanting to pull him away from the prying eyes of the men.

Nor did he catch the death stare aimed his way.