Of course, we didn’t get that far. My mind was in a haze to even reconsider such a bold idea for our first real encounter. Sorry, our first, rather unforeseen, date.
Cassiel was surprisingly bearable the rest of our evening, not that his high-maintenance attitude was any less pervasive than before. He’d taken me on a cruise over the Srylian lake. Watching the brink of sunset tinge the navy water and inhaling the foreign ocean breeze, the troublesome realities I’d discovered today seemed insignificant.
That was only a momentary diversion. Like the heavens had bestowed upon me, dark clouds had returned in the sky, draping the city in gloom and ending our rendezvous early. The weather really did have my back.
When Cassiel dropped me off at the mansion, I was figuring out how to confront th
