The Call to War

Chapter 20

The other students didn't stop as they continued to run through the course, a few more joining the first. As they came out of the water, the male students froze as they saw Lilia sitting there just a few feet away. Lilia smiled kindly and waved, to which they waved back with goofy smiles on their faces.

"Quit ogling pretty girls and get back on the course!" Curtis yelled with a furious expression. "Keep this up and I'll have you all running laps around the field!"

The boys quickly scrambled back atop their beasts and took off back to the beginning of the previous obstacle. Seeing his students on the move again, Curtis' expression immediately softened as he looked to Lilia, giving her a warm smile as he waved to her. Lilia waved back as a cold winter breeze blew, causing her to wrap herself a little tighter in her cloak. Despite the warming artifact she kept around her wrist, a sudden drop in temperature from something like the wind could still give her chills.

Curtis blew a whistle, and a large black bird with a female rider landed beside him. Her back was to Lilia so she couldn't see her face, all she could tell was that the woman had dark hair. He appeared to say a few words to the female rider while making hand gestures, before she took back to the air, and Curtis was riding over to Lilia. As the black bird took off Lilia was able to get a quick glance at the rider's face, and knew right away that she had seen her before.

"What are you doing?" Lilia asked with a smirk as he arrived. "You shouldn't be ogling pretty girls right now either."

"I'm not," Curtis asked as he jumped down from Grawders back. "I'm actively flirting with a very beautiful girl, there's a difference."

He then bent over and placed his right hand on her cheek and kissed her.

"I'm also taking care of you," he added as he broke the kiss and handed her a key. "It's cold out here, you can wait for me in my office if you'd like."

"I'm fine. I'd like to watch you teach," Lilia replied smiling. "Although I do wonder, do you have to sound so mean?"

"Trust me, I'm not as bad as the department head. He wouldn't have given a warning and just would have punished the whole class because of those guys checking you out," Curtis explained as he sat down beside her.

"Shouldn't you still be out there?"

"My assistant has them for now. She might not be as loud as me, but the students will listen just as well."

"So your assistant is a woman," Lilia thought out loud as her insecurities started to surface again, but she fought them back down. In some ways it was hard for Lilia to be dating Curtis, as his good looks alone were enough to catch nearly any girl's attention. Despite this fact though, Curtis always remained loyal to her, so she tried hard to trust him when they were apart.

"She has to be. I've got female students, so there needs to be a female teacher to be able to go down their hall. No males allowed except for staff with her as an escort," he explained.

After a few more minutes Curtis gave her a thermos of soup, his snack he was going to use to warm himself after class. He then jumped back onto Grawders back and rode back into his teaching role. Lilia smiled as he returned to his students, sounding more positive and encouraging than when he was yelling before. If not for the war Lilia had little doubt that she would have followed him to the academy to stay close to him, perhaps even living with him. Her smile then faded, remembering the conversation she was going to have to have, and not knowing how it would go.

Thirty minutes later the sun was setting and Curtis dismissed his class for the day, before helping Lilia on to Grawder and heading back to the dorms where he lived.