Page 46 of Bound to the Dorm Elf
Rovax’s mouth curves, not in amusement but in something sharper. “Neither do you.”
For a moment, it’s just the two of them staring each other down, and I’m caught between wanting to get the hell out of this room and wanting to see who flinches first.
Bill’s the one who breaks. He straightens his jacket, nods like he’s just made some private decision, and heads for the door. As he passes Rovax, he says quietly, “This isn’t over.”
Rovax doesn’t reply, just watches him go until the sound of his footsteps fades down the hall.
Then he turns to me. The tension in his shoulders hasn’t eased, but his eyes sweep over me in a quick, assessing way. “Are you hurt?”
I shake my head, still trying to catch up to what just happened. “You—how did you even know?—”
“I followed you,” he says simply, as if that’s not creepy or overbearing at all.
I should be annoyed. I should tell him he’s being ridiculous. Instead, I hear myself say, “Good.”
His gaze lingers a moment longer, unreadable, before he nods once. “Let’s go.”
And just like that, I’m moving — not because he told me to, but because every instinct I have is telling me Bill’s right about one thing:
this isn’t over.
The hallway feels too narrow with Rovax beside me.
Not because of his size — though, yeah, he takes up more space than the average human — but because of the way the air changes when he’s near.
We don’t speak as we leave the building. My boots squeak faintly on the linoleum, his footfalls silent, deliberate. The shadows outside stretch long across the cracked sidewalk, streetlamps casting their amber halos in the chill. I shove my hands into my pockets and stare straight ahead, my pulse still buzzing from the confrontation.
Half of me wants to turn on him, demand why he thinks following me without asking is okay. The other half is still tryingto process the fact that when Bill cornered me, Rovax was there. Not after. Not too late.There.
The silence stretches until it’s tight enough to snap.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I finally say, my breath clouding in the cold. “I could’ve handled him.”
Rovax glances down at me, his expression as unreadable as ever. “You shouldn’t have to.”
I let out a short, frustrated laugh. “That’s not the point.”
He doesn’t answer right away, and I can feel him weighing his words the way a gambler weighs loaded dice. “The point,” he says slowly, “is that he was circling you. Testing. Seeing how far he could push.” His tone sharpens. “I ended it before he decided he could push further.”
“Yeah, and now you’ve painted a giant target on yourself,” I snap. “Those guys already think something’s off about you. You just confirmed it.”
He stops walking. I take two more steps before I realize and turn back. His eyes are fixed on me — not angry, exactly, but intense in a way that makes the hair on my arms rise.
“Let them look at me,” he says. “Better me than you.”
I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. There’s a raw certainty in his voice that throws me off balance. No sarcasm, no arrogance, just… truth.
I look away first, my gaze skittering to the cracked pavement, the stray leaf caught in a swirl of wind. “That’s not how it works here,” I mutter. “You can’t just absorb all the danger like some… like some human shield.”
He tilts his head slightly, studying me, trying to figure out if I actually believe that. “In my world, you shield those you intend to keep.”
The words hit low, somewhere in the part of me I’ve been trying very hard not to acknowledge. My heartbeat stutters.
We start walking again, the quiet between us different now — thicker, weighted with something that’s not quite anger anymore. I’m still irritated, still wound tight from the ambush, but there’s something else coiled under it: relief. And the longer we walk, the more I realize that relief is growing harder to ignore.
By the time we reach the dorm, my hands are cold but my face feels warm, and not just from the brisk night air.
Inside, the fluorescent lights seem too bright, too sterile after the dark outside. Rovax follows me up the stairs, moving with the same soundless precision he always does. I unlock the door and step inside, kicking off my boots harder than necessary.
