The silence after his confession carried the weight of thunder.

Husband.

The word reverberated in Aisa’s mind.

“I can’t believe it.”

Her pulse surged, but she kept her expression steady, forcing herself to meet his strange silver gaze.

“If that is true,” she said evenly, though her voice trembled at the edges
“There should be proof. Like a couple’s rings, for example. You and I aren’t wearing any.”

Atlas did not flinch. Instead, he lowered his eyes toward the fireplace, where the small flames licked at the grate. His pale hair caught the light, gleaming faintly gold before falling platinum blonde again. His answer came with the deliberateness of someone choosing each word carefully.

“In this land, people like us—ordinary folk—cannot purchase such tokens. Bands of metal belong to nobles, merchants, those who can spare the coin. We have no rings, because we are commoners.”

His calm delivery did not soften the unease that threaded through her chest.

Aisa folded her hands, fingers clasped tightly together to keep them from trembling. Rings were not a matter of wealth; she knew this instinctively, the thought rising from some buried part of her memory that remained intact. Even a thread of twine, a carved sliver of wood, a bent scrap of iron could serve. What mattered was the symbol. The choice. The intent.

She wanted to confront him with this, to pierce through his explanation. Yet something—perhaps exhaustion, perhaps the measured gentleness in his eyes—held her tongue. She weighed the argument silently, filing away the discrepancy.

“I see,” she murmured instead, her tone cool, neither acceptance nor rejection.

Atlas studied her with quiet patience, as though he had expected her doubt. His expression remained composed and understanding.

She let her gaze drift across the wide room, noting details she had missed before. Heavy beams stretched overhead, their surfaces worn smooth by age. The wooden floor creaked faintly beneath every shift of her weight. Sparse furniture: the couch where he sat, a small table, a chair angled near the fire. No scattered belongings, no signs of two lives shared. The emptiness gnawed at her.

“You said we live here, together,” she said after a long pause. “If that’s true, why do I see no trace of myself in this space? No garment, no book, no object to tell me who I was?”

Atlas exhaled slowly. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, hands folded loosely. The gesture was almost contemplative, like a man answering questions before a quiet council.

“You were always orderly,” he replied softly. “You disliked clutter, preferred emptiness. To you, a bare room meant a clear mind.”

The answer was plausible, but it felt incomplete. Aisa narrowed her eyes, not missing the way his words seemed to close the subject rather than open it.

“And this village.” she pressed, ignoring his evasion. “What kind of place is it? You call it a village at the kingdom’s edge, but what does that mean? Who lives here? What do we do?”

Atlas did not recoil from her sharpness. Instead, he met her gaze again, silver eyes steady, voice calm. “Marra is small village in the south. Fields are in the north, forests to the east. We trade what we grow, mend what we can, endure storms like this one. Life here is quiet.”

It was too vague. Too neat.

“…Quiet, you say” she repeated flatly. “And yet, I wake without a memory, in a room that feels more like a cell than a home, with no trace of myself.

Her words cut, sharper than she had intended, but she didn’t regret them. She wanted to see if he would flinch.

Atlas did not. His expression softened instead, though his composure remained unbroken. He leaned back against the couch once more, hands open on his knees, as if to show her he carried no malice.

“You are sharper than most, Aisa,” he said quietly, almost with admiration. “Even without memory, you notice what others might ignore. But answers will not come all at once. Give yourself time.”

The gentleness disarmed her more than denial would have. His patience was unnerving, a calm certainty that suggested he knew far more than he admitted.

She pressed her lips together, frustrated. “Time may not return what I’ve lost. And patience will not tell me why you are here.”

At this, his gaze lowered, and silence fell again. He did not rush to speak, and she sensed he weighed something behind his stillness. She watched every flicker of movement: the faint tightening of his jaw, the shift of his fingers, the way the firelight etched shadows across his face.

Finally, he lifted his head. His voice, when it came, was gentle but unyielding. “Why not? Why should I not be here?”

The answer felt like a deflection, and Aisa’s pulse quickened. She opened her mouth to press him harder, but he spoke before she could.

“I’ll always be by your side.” he continued, silver eyes holding hers steadily, “because I am your husband.”

Her breath caught. That word again. Spoken not as a claim to be argued but as an inevitability, as natural as the storm outside.

Her mind whirled. She studied him—the curve of his jaw, the soft fall of pale hair, the strange stillness that clung to him. Nothing in her heart recognized him. Nothing in her bones stirred at the word husband. Yet he said it with such certainty that she faltered.

“You expect me to believe that,” she said slowly, her voice cutting but quiet, “without memory, without proof, without even a token of it?”

Atlas did not raise his voice, did not harden his tone. He simply regarded her with the same patient calm, as though he had expected every word she now hurled at him.

“I expect you to believe what you will,” he replied softly. “Doubt if you must. Question everything. I will not stop you. But the truth remains unchanged, whether you accept it now or later.”

His composure unsettled her more than any anger could have. He gave her no weakness to exploit, no defensive edge to sharpen her arguments against. Only quiet certainty, steady as stone beneath water.

Aisa turned her face toward the fireplace, the flames blurring as her thoughts spun.

She wanted to dismiss it all, to declare him a liar. But something restrained her, something in the way he carried himself—patient, deliberate, careful as though she were a fragile bird perched on his hand.

Her voice dropped to a whisper. “If you are truly my husband… then what kind of woman was I?”

Atlas’s expression shifted, almost imperceptibly. His silver eyes softened, though shadows lingered at their depths. He inhaled, exhaled, then answered with words so quiet she barely caught them over the storm.

“Lets talk more tomorrow. Your complexion isn’t good and you are still sick”

Her frustration rose, but she bit it back. His answer frustrated her, yet it also told her something: he would not paint her a false picture. She thinks so. He gave her only what he thought she could bear.

She studied him carefully, the man who claimed to be hers. His patience unnerved her, his gentleness disarmed her, his evasions inflamed her.

And she realized, with a chill that sank deep into her bones, that the most dangerous lies were often the ones told with tenderness.

“So be it.”

The words tasted bitter, but she let them fall, thin armor against his calm. The storm outside battered the roof with merciless persistence, filling the silence between them. Atlas did not press her further. He merely inclined his head, almost a bow, as though acknowledging not defeat but endurance.

Aisa turned from the fire, her limbs heavy, her thoughts heavier still. She took a tentative step, her bare feet recoiling at the icy wood. Her body wavered, unsteady, and before she could protest, Atlas was at her side.

He did not touch her without asking. His movements were deliberate, careful, his presence like a shadow that never forced itself forward. “Lean on me, if you wish,” he murmured.

“I can walk,” she replied, though her voice lacked conviction. Still, she allowed him to remain a half-step away, his nearness a steadying force she resented but did not reject.

They moved through the dim passage together, the storm’s rhythm echoing above them. The door she had opened earlier loomed ahead, the bed inside barely visible in the faint spill of firelight. Each step felt longer than it should, her mind retreating inward, weighing the strange contradictions of the man beside her.

When at last they reached the room, Atlas moved ahead to pull the covers back. His hands—long, elegant fingers pale as bone—handled the coarse fabric with quiet grace. Then he turned toward her, and for a heartbeat his silver eyes caught the flicker of distant lightning.

“Sit,” he said gently.

Her pride urged defiance, but weariness drowned it. She lowered herself onto the edge of the bed. The mattress dipped beneath her weight, the fabric smelling faintly of cedar and smoke. Atlas knelt slightly, guiding the blanket until it wrapped around her shoulders, cocooning her against the chill.

“I don’t need—” she began.

“Stay still.” he interrupted softly, his tone carrying no force, only plea. “You are pale, Aisa. You have to rest.”

The sound of her name unsettled her again. She bit back another retort and allowed him to adjust the covers, though her eyes never left his face. Every movement of his hands was considerate, never lingering, never pressing. When he was satisfied, he stepped back, giving her space as though aware she might flee at any sudden closeness.

“If you need anything,” he said, voice low, steady as the rain’s drum, “call my name. I will hear you.”

Her throat tightened. She searched his face, but the shadows carved by the dim light betrayed nothing.

She shifted under the blanket, watching him as he lingered by the doorway. “Where will you sleep?”

He smiled faintly, a fleeting curve of lips that did not quite reach his eyes. “Here, by the fire. The couch is enough.”

Aisa frowned. “Why? Surely you said that we—”

His head tilted, the platinum strands falling like pale silk across his face. “Because you do not trust me. Not yet. It would be unkind to impose myself beside you when your heart questions who I am.”

The honesty disarmed her, leaving her silent. She could not argue with it. She did not trust him. Every instinct screamed caution, even as something deeper recognized the tenderness with which he moved, the patience in his voice.

“Alright.” she said at last, though her tone carried less conviction than she wished.

Atlas inclined his head once more. “Good night, Aisa.”

He stepped back, retreating into the hall, but not before casting one last glance at her. The look was not searching, not pleading, only quiet—an acknowledgment, perhaps, that her walls would take time to lower. Then he turned away, leaving the faint creak of floorboards and the lingering sense of a presence dissapearing slowly.

The door remained slightly ajar, and through it she caught the flicker of firelight as he returned to the couch. The storm’s roar filled the void, steady, merciless. Wrapped in blankets, she sank against the mattress, her thoughts racing too quickly for rest.

Atlas. Her supposed husband. The claim gnawed at her.

And yet, as exhaustion dragged her downward, the image that lingered was not of deceit, nor of menace, but of a man sitting alone by the fire, silver eyes shadowed, carrying secrets like stones bound to his chest.