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Milva sighed as she prodded at the ground with a stick. She’d learned to tune out Dandelion’s constant stream of words. He was currently pontificating about some rhyming structure or something that he’d learnt at Oxenfurt, and Milva couldn’t care less. She wasn’t entirely sure why she was still following the witcher and his company across the Continent. She’d been drawn to him, she supposed. He seemed to have the effect on people. She glanced up at the group and scoffed. Not one of them were alike, and yet their friendship seemed to go beyond reason.
She’d even made friends with a vampire.
If someone had told her that when she’d been a girl then she would have laughed. Vampires were monsters after all, but recently Milva was starting to wonder what the true definition of monster was; Regis just didn’t fit the bill anymore.
Dandelion began to pluck at his lute, simpering about the virtues of true love, and Milva almost reached for her bow. She’d had enough of the poet’s never-ending cooing and romanticising of the world. Love wasn’t everything.
She hoped.
She flinched as she remembered the touch of her elven lover, a coupling brought on by desperation and the need to feel close to someone in their last moments.
But she’d survived. Her unborn child had survived, and she was alone. She’d always been alone by choice but now the prospect of raising a child by herself terrified her. Would she be forced into a loveless marriage?
“Fuck,” she hissed, standing abruptly and moving closer to the tree lines surrounding their camp. She heard the trill of the poet fall silence and she knew they were all looking at her. She didn’t turn around. She didn’t want them to see her tears.
She shrugged off the hand on her shoulder, wrinkling her nose at the now familiar scent of sage and thyme.
“I’m fine, Regis.”
“I am quite sure you are, my dear, but I can see something is bothering you. I am here to listen should you need an ear, I have two actually,” the vampire chuckled at his own joke.
Milva rolled her eyes, hiding her smile. “Love,” she muttered, “everyone is obsessed with love, and I… I’ve never felt it, not in the way Dandelion talks about.”
“And this upsets you?”
She nodded. “I’m broken, Regis. Don’t you see?”
To her surprise the vampire just laughed. She turned to glare at him but she was caught off-guard by the twinkle in his eyes, like he knew something she didn’t; a secret. He gestured for the bow on her back. “May I?”
She narrowed her eyes at him, but reluctantly handed her weapon over. “Here.”
“Thank you, now, you know I believe it’s quite fitting that you chose the bow as your weapon, dear Milva,” he hummed thoughtfully as his fingers trailed along the string.
“Why?”
“Because, and correct me if I’m wrong, you are aro.”
“Arrow?” Milva scoffed. She was just about ready to rip her precious bow from the vampire’s hands and march off into the forest. “This isn’t funny, vampire.”
“Aro,” Regis replied, his voice a gentle whisper. “Aromantic. You don’t experience romantic attraction?” She shook her head. “Well neither do I. We vampires coined a term for it before you humans had even arrived on the Continent, and yet it never really caught on with your species. It’s such a shame.”
Milva frowned, trying to process Regis’s words. She wasn’t broken, and she wasn’t alone. It was too much for her to think about it one go. She took her bow and ran. She would be back later that evening, hopefully with some food they could cook for breakfast, but she needed a moment by herself.
Aro.
Not broken.
She wanted to laugh. It all seemed so ridiculous after all this time, but maybe it was just a new chapter in her life. She would thank the vampire in the morning, because she wasn’t alone anymore.