The air in the room crackled, the previously tentative shift in atmosphere vanishing like smoke in a gale swept through an open window. The delicate balance Lloyd had attempted to introduce, the slight disruption to their cold, established routine, had shattered against the wall of Rosa's immediate and potent displeasure. Her eyes, which had perhaps flickered with a microsecond of unguarded surprise, now blazed with a chilling fury. It wasn't hot rage, not the explosive anger of lesser tempers; it was the frigid, focused indignation of someone whose control had been unexpectedly challenged. The faint hint of a blush, likely imagined by Lloyd in a moment of wishful thinking, was utterly eradicated, replaced by a pale rigidity. Her features, already defined by a certain aristocratic sharpness, hardened into an icy mask of command.
"Get. Out."
Each word was a perfectly formed icicle, clipped and sharp, delivered with the precise force of a physical blow aimed directly at his unwelcome presence. It wasn't merely a request fueled by irritation; it resonated with the ingrained authority of a Viscount's daughter, the assumed privilege of nobility, and the sharp, defensive reaction of someone deeply uncomfortable with vulnerability or unplanned intimacy. This was the Rosa he remembered from the fragmented, awkward memories of his first life – the young woman who wielded distance and disdain like both a shield against perceived threats and a sword to keep the world at bay.
Lloyd's smile, the one he'd carefully constructed from eighty years of worldly experience and plastered onto his nineteen-year-old face, didn't waver, though the muscles around his mouth tightened infinitesimally. A tiny betrayal of the effort it took. He held his ground, maintaining the deliberately casual lean against the sturdy mahogany bedpost. His posture was meant to convey a lack of intimidation, a refusal to be cowed, a stark contrast to the cringing retreat his former self would have executed. Nineteen-year-old Lloyd would have been halfway down the corridor by now, tripping over his own feet in his haste to escape the palpable disapproval, mumbling apologies for breathing the same air. Eighty-year-old Lloyd, however, had faced down corporate sharks, navigated academic minefields, endured the stark realities of military life on Earth, and developed a resilience far exceeding mere teenage indignation, even magically enhanced indignation.
"I don't think so," he replied, his voice remarkably calm, maintaining an even, almost conversational tone that directly contradicted the glacial hostility radiating from her. "We're married, Rosa." He let the word hang in the air for a beat, a simple statement of fact that felt loaded with unspoken complexities. "This is technically my room too, even if current sleeping arrangements are..." he paused, searching for a diplomatic term, "...unconventional." He gestured vaguely towards the plush, yet undeniably lonely-looking, sofa nestled against the far wall, a silent acknowledgment of the status quo he was now determined to dismantle.
Rosa's eyes narrowed further, becoming dangerous slits of obsidian fury. The air temperature seemed to drop several degrees. "I warned you," she hissed, her voice dropping to a low, menacing whisper that was somehow more terrifying than her earlier shout. It vibrated with suppressed power, a predator's warning before the strike. "Don't push me, Lloyd. You have no idea what you're dealing with."
He simply looked back at her, the smile still playing faintly on his lips, his eyes holding hers steadily. He refused to break contact, refused to show the fear that nineteen-year-old Lloyd would have felt consuming him. Deep within her gaze, behind the icy anger, he saw it – the flicker, the gathering storm of focused energy. Raw Spirit Power coalescing, preparing to be unleashed. He knew what was coming. He braced himself internally, not physically – there was no physical defense against this – but mentally. He dredged up reserves of fortitude honed over decades of disparate challenges on Earth: the focused intensity needed to debug lines of faulty code under crushing deadlines; the stubborn persistence required to argue grant proposals with committees seemingly designed to say 'no'; the sheer grit developed during grueling military drills under unforgiving instructors; the quiet endurance learned during long, tense watches in simulated combat zones. These experiences, seemingly irrelevant in this world of magic and nobility, had forged a core of resilience within him, a bedrock beneath the surface of the awkward nineteen-year-old body he inhabited.
Suddenly, it hit him.