The Apathetic Mage Loves Cats

Chapter 20: Before-Anxiousness

"Caiden." I stood at the foot of Caiden's bed; my hands crossed as I waited for a response. "Caiden," I called out once more. I had been standing there for a few minutes, trying to get him to wake up. Well, just trying to get him out of bed. He wasn't actually sleeping, but just lying there, waiting for... something. Or more like hiding from something.

Last night, he had been a mess. Whining; angsty; tired of it all before it had even started. He was excited for this ceremony before, to prove his worth to either me or to himself; but now, he just seemed nervous. Nervous, to show that he didn't fully know what he was going to do tonight. He didn't understand exactly what was going to happen. And I had noticed the subtle switch as yesterday slowly came to a close and he no longer had any reason to keep pushing his anxious thoughts away.

In the few months that I had been guarding him, I realized that he was actually a sensitive person. He liked keeping to a schedule so that he wouldn't be surprised throughout the day, and he had everything planned out as finely as possible. However, there were times that certain unavoidable situations popped up. Such as the time where a stable aid had accidentally let loose some horses into the castle. Well, it wasn't exactly his fault. It was, as one would call it, a series of unfortunate events, that started with the aid taking two horses back to their stables after a night walk, and his helper walking behind him with two horses as well. Before that, a couple of knights that evening had decided to spend their day off drinking and when they had come back to the house, they thought it would be funny to hide around a corner and scare one of the friends. However, they accidentally caught the stable aids instead. This, in turn, spooked the horses bad enough for the aids to lose control of their reins, and the horses ran off towards the castle doors; which were only open at that particular time because Caiden requested them to be, so that a slight breeze would waft throughout the halls. Additionally, Caiden had insisted that these few knights were to take a break because they had been working for almost two weeks straight, and he thought they needed one. So, ultimately, it was because of Caiden that these rather unfortunate events occurred. Or at least, that's what he believed.

Regardless, Caiden and I were in the main hall during that time, and I barely managed to push him out of the way of the trampling horses before he got caught beneath them. He appeared calm and collected when everyone was telling their sides of the story (after the aids had regained control of the horses), but afterward, he dragged me to his room and lay frozen on the bed for hours, trembling beneath the covers. I stood in the corner –which allowed him to feel safe and secure– and waited until he fell asleep before returning to my own room to rest. The next morning, I was the only one permitted in his room until noon, when he finally managed to get up and get his day started. It was only a little while later that he admitted he wasn't scared of the horses, but of the fact that he had to speak with the flustered and stammering mean –and that he had to smell alcohol on them while speaking– which caused him to feel drained, exhausted, and unwell. That and many more incidents where he had surprise company lead me to believe that he had some sort of social anxiety which caused him to get flustered around people.

But what do I know? I'm just a stupid mage.

Regardless, this was probably why we were in this situation; his body refusing to move beneath the covers on his bed, pretending that neither I nor this day existed. However, I can sadly say that we both very well existed in this time and place, and it was up to him to finally come out from his secure space and make his grand debut. The show took place in only a few hours, and there was too much to do for him to lay around. Unfortunately, there was only one way to get him up and active.

Fear.

"If you're not out of bed by the time I count down from five, I will purposefully make Romand watch over you the entire night and I won't even attend." Before I even started counting, his body shot up faster than a dog after hearing a bag of chips rumble and he glared at me in horrid anger.