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Arpina usually prides herself on her situational awareness. It is her upbringing that contributes to this, because not being aware of your surroundings would mean that you would not be ready for the shifting tempers and moods of the people around you. Moreover, as a thief, she’s always had a keen sense of her environment. (She doesn’t want to call it paranoia—but then someone would have been watching her all those times she logically knew she was not.)
The feeling has escaped her recently. Interestingly enough, it began when she’s had Miraak tagging along on her travels. But, this time, she realizes that he has been watching her. It strikes her strangely, because she’s always known that he likes watching people. Maybe she should’ve expected know that she counts. It doesn’t make her feel uncomfortable, to put it as simply as possible. But still—it’s strange.
It had happened when she had come back from looking for flowers in a glade. While she was there, spying butterflies and plucking petals, the feeling of being watched had hit her all of a sudden. She had shot up and looked around, seeking the person—or creature watching her. Her gaze had gone far into the distant treeline, but when she had finally turned around, she realized that it was Miraak watching her.
“What were you looking for?” Miraak had asked upon her return.
“Lavender,” she had replied. “I was running out, I wanted to make some oil.”
“I thought so.”
They had set up camp off the side of the road—she wasn’t keen on traveling in the dark, and dusk had caught up to them far too soon. Now, she sits by the fire watching him cook (she didn’t ask what, but she knows she doesn’t have to because, amusingly enough, whatever he makes is amazingly good). Her gaze lingers on his face, as though trying to figure something out.
“Why are you staring?”
Arpina starts. “Well,” she says, smile forming on her lips, “I could ask you the same thing of earlier. When I was in the field, I mean, why were you watching me?”
“Am I not supposed to?” Miraak replies plainly, glancing up at her to raise his brows in questions.
She’s always liked how expressive he can be. It’s charming, the way he does that. “You can,” she says, and glances away with a grin. “You get that feeling, yes? That there are eyes on you?”
“For the longest time.” He’s surprisingly talkative. Arpina likes it, but admitting that she does would only serve to shut him up, she thinks. “And then it disappeared. A relief.”
“I would imagine,” she murmurs. She still cannot fathom how he survived Apocrypha. If not through the body, then through the mind—she wouldn’t have lasted. “Was it—was he always watching?”
“Often,” he says. “Why do you think it took me 5000 years?”
“Perhaps you fell asleep through it. Books can be a bore, I won’t blame you for it.”
His sharp eyes, piercingly luminescent green, flick up to her keenly.
Arpina gives him an expectant look in return.
Finally, finally, he lets out a little huff of amusement, the faintest hit of a smile on his lips. “That may be the lightest way to put it.”
It’s strange, how she can feel the warmth of the fire in her chest at those words. She purses her lips, then says, “I’ve been told my tendencies lie there.”
“Color me surprised,” he says dryly, and takes a bowl, filling it with stew then offering it to her. “Careful. It’s hot.”
“Thank you,” she says, giving him a grateful smile. “Is this—I like this! Venison stew.”
Miraak doesn’t respond, but huffs again, as though he was expecting her to say that. He takes his own serving and sits next to her, gazing up at the twisting, pink and green lights in the sky. It casts this ethereal light on him, moon-bright against the warm glow of the fire—and despite the way he keeps the emotion off his face, nothing could hide the reverence in his eyes.
“Enchanting,” Arpina says with a smile.
“What?” Miraak asks, attention returning to her. She doesn’t think he heard her.
“I said,” she says, placing emphasis on the last word and only pausing to raise her soup bowl to her lips. “That you’re the most captivating person I’ve ever met.”
“You didn’t say that,” he says, brow furrowing.
“Well, you’ll never find out what it was, so maybe settle for the compliment?”
Miraak gives her a long, scrutinizing look. Arpina meets it easily, unwilling to break their gaze. Looking away used to feel like defeat. Now?
He’s the first to break their stare. She wishes he did not.