#sorpeliedit

Opeli lights her third candle of the night without looking at him, though she can feel his eyes on her. The back of her neck prickles. “Come to pray penance, have you?”

Soren snorts softly. “I don’t have anything to perform penance over, High Cleric.”

“Yet.”

Some of the sword stuff reminds him of the vows he had to memorize when he’d become a knight a couple years ago, Opeli holding the sword over his shoulders; he’d been sixteen, swaggering and so sure it would make his father proud—and it did, to a degree. It feels like a lifetime ago. Now here he is, checking out the poetry tastes of his father’s most bitter political rival at court... and for what?  It’s one thing to write poetry for himself and have Opeli wear her bemused little smirk when he wasn’t trying to impress her anyway. It’s another to put in effort and present something specifically for her, and... what if she still doesn’t like it?