Hi everyone!

Enjoy the new chapter!!! I also wanted to mention that I put an important and personal note at the end of the chapter that I would love for people to read, especially if you've gotten this far into the story!

Don't forget to vote and comment to let me know your thoughts! <3

Love, luckycharms <3



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Thea had no idea how her grandmother got to her so quickly, but there she was, grinning ear to ear at Niall. "I've seen your face in the papers," her grandmother said. "You're General Niall Killian. How lovely!"

Niall removed his scarf to reveal his face, holding it in his hands as he smiled respectfully at the woman. "It's lovely to meet you. I've heard quite a bit about you, Professor Rhaanan."

Thea raised a brow. No one called her grandmother that anymore, but it seemed like her grandmother was thrilled. "Oh please, just call me grandma. You're a friend of Thea's, after all."

"He's my boss," Thea said quickly.

"Didn't care much about that when you were complimenting his eyelashes now were you?" Her grandmother muttered, pretending to try and be quiet though being perfectly clear enough for the General to hear.

And in response, Thea felt her blood rush to her face in embarrassment, ignoring the General's raised brows. God, she would have strangled the woman if Thea didn't love her so much.

"Oh, where are your manners, Thea? It's freezing outside, invite the man in," her grandmother said, ignoring the look of distress on her granddaughters face. "General Killian, you must stay for dinner."

Thea felt her heart stop as she looked up at Niall, who was still smiling despite wearing an expression that showed his surprise. Clearly he hadn't expected such awkwardness from Thea's grandmother, and then to be welcomed in for dinner with the Rhaanan's.

Frowning in an attempt to hide her embarrassment, Thea kept her eyes low and then proceeded to sigh before she stepped aside, opening the door wider. "Please, come in."

She didn't know how it happened but soon, she was sitting in the living room with her grandmother, father and Niall, who was sitting across from her, the newspaper with Niall's picture in it still spread open on the couch she was sitting on before the man himself showed up.

Despite Niall being nothing but respectful, there was a tension in the room through all the small talk between her parents and Niall that Thea knew everyone could feel. Of course, that was expected... seeing as the General of the Aiverian Army and the Deputy Secretary of Defense was sitting on a pretty little couch in the little home of a modest Elorian family.

"How is she doing in Achlis?" Thea's father asked, trying to break the tension at least a little but also sounding like a parent asking a teacher about how their child was doing in school. "She tells us she enjoys the work she's doing there, though it keeps her busy."

Thea felt her cheeks burn more.

She had not told her family yet that she had quit... she didn't know how. She didn't know how to tell them that she quit because she was mad that her team didn't tell her that Aaryan was alive. She didn't even know how and if she could tell them that Aaryan was alive.

However, it seemed Niall understood, seeing as his response was simply: "She does great work there. She's a valuable asset to the team and we've taken incredibly large steps forward in our projects thanks to her contributions."

"I expect nothing less from our girl," Thea's grandmother beamed. "She's so passionate about helping people, our people. Thank you for giving her the opportunity to do such work... in the State Military Headquarters no less."

"Grams..." Thea sighed, embarrassed and keeping her eyes away from Niall as Thea's mother walked in with a cup of tea.

She handed it to Niall with a gentle but also nervous smile. Thea could tell that she was more than happy with the fact that Theus was still out on 'business.' He'd been gone for a few days now and though he claimed it was work related, everyone knew it had something to do with the Revolutionary Crows. It was therefore a relief to everyone that the family Crow was not home while the General of the Aiverian Army was here for dinner. "Dinner will be ready shortly," she said. "We'd love for you to join us."

Thea felt Niall look at her, but she continued to look away. "I don't want to be a bother."

"No bother at all," her mother said. "We have plenty of extra space and food."

"We insist," Thea's grandmother pushed as Niall took a sip of his tea.

"Well, in that case, prior to any dinner, I was hoping I could have a word with Theavi?" He asked, and when everyone just smiled and nodded, he added, "in private. It's work related."

Before anyone could respond, Thea stood up. "I know it's cold, but let's step outside."

"Oh, let him at least finish his tea first," her grandmother insisted.

Thea held back an eye roll and sat back down, waiting for Niall to finish his tea as her overenthusiastic grandmother continued to embarrass her.







When the horror of Thea's grandmother's pleasure in embarrassing her was finally over, no thanks to Niall, who seemed to be sipping at the tea like it was molten lava... looking almost as if he was enjoying Thea's squirming, Thea walked down the main street of her neighborhood, towards the old bridge, with Niall following behind her.

They were quiet for a while, and Thea sighed. "What are you doing here?" she finally asked him as they reached the little stone bridge.

"I think it should be obvious," Niall said from behind her.

Thea stopped walking when she reached the highest point of the bridge, turning to face him. He had his hands stuffed into the pockets of his long, thick coat and was wearing a warm looking scarf around his neck. Despite looking warm, he looked rather uncomfortable, making it quite clear that he did not like the cold.

Though Thea also did not like the cold, she seemed to be doing better than he was, feeling a almost fine in just her thick coat and boots, her thick hair providing the warmth and protection she needed for her head and around her neck.

"You're not really quitting, are you?" He continued when she didn't respond.

Thea hesitated, blinking a few times before responding. "I... didn't know I could take that back."

Niall looked at her with an exasperated expression. "What?" he scoffed. "You've been hanging around here because you didn't know you could take it back?"

She frowned, embarrassed.

"You don't want to quit?"

She pursed her lips, looking down at the shallow river that was now frozen over below them. "Of course I don't want to quit."

Niall scoffed again, a look of disbelief flushing over his face before he surprised Thea by grabbing her arm and pulling her into a tight, warm hug.

Thea was frozen for a moment, surprised by the hug. She didn't expect this, not at all, not when she had been so dramatic and unfair to him, but her heart was racing and as she wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him back, she appreciated the warmth of his body against hers.

"How is it that you are both so incredibly smart, but also incredibly stupid?" He asked, his breath warm against the top of her head.

Thea frowned into his chest. It certainly wasn't the first time that someone had asked her that, but she supposed she deserved it. Pulling away but still keeping her hands on his chest, she looked up at him. "Why didn't you tell me that you told Aaryan to talk to me?"

"If you take a moment to think back to the night of your outburst, you might remember that you barely gave me a moment to speak."

"That's not true."

"Yes it is," he said. "You accused me of lying to you, revealed to everyone on the team that we had kissed, and then stormed out. I can't imagine where I would have fit in my response."

Her cheeks began to burn.

Oh yeah.

She had forgotten about the kiss part, thinking immediately that it was an absolute miracle that Luana didn't bring this up in their calls... but then again, Luana was probably trying very hard not to upset Thea, after all. Sure she was a little drunk on the night of her outburst, but how could she be so stupid. "Sorry... about that..." she mumbled.

Niall chuckled before pulling away completely and walking over to the railing of the bridge. He leaned against it, looking out at the frozen river. "What's done is done. I'm just happy to hear you didn't mean it when you said you quit."

"Of course I didn't mean it," she said with a sigh as she joined him, standing by his side and leaning against the railing as well, folding her arms over the top of it. "How could I leave Rue behind like that... all mangled up... I was just angry... and dumb... and drunk."

Niall looked at her with a smile. "So you spoke to Aari?"

She nodded.

"Have you two worked it out?"

"No," she responded. "Yes, I think the way I treated you was silly, but I don't feel that way about the way I treated Aaryan. He's such a fool and makes stupid, rash decisions and doesn't care how those decisions affect the people around him."

Thea saw Niall attempt to hide an eyeroll before he turned his head and flashed his eyebrows at the ice below them... and she knew exactly what he was implying with that. "Sounds quite familiar," he said, clearly choosing not to hold back his thoughts.

Thea was going to argue but then frowned again.

Was he right?

Was Luana right too, back before Mayra had accidently told her about Aaryan?

Were she and Aaryan really that similar?

That didn't really help her cause to want to be angry at him.

Niall chuckled, seeing the sudden concern and confusion on her face. "I'm not going to pretend I now Aari more than you do–"

"You probably do," Thea said, a little glumly, "judging by what I've seen."

"I don't," Niall's voice was firm. "I've made it clear already, I don't look into my people's pasts more than I need to and I don't push my people to tell me things they don't want to tell me. I may know a few things you don't know since he's been with me during a time when he was absent in your life, but that doesn't mean I know him better."

Thea frowned, seeming a little childish.

"And what I was going to say is that from what I do know about him, and from what I've seen on his face at the mention of you, is that he does care about you," he gave her a somewhat sad looking smile, "so go easy on him."

Thea was pouting as she stared at the river below them. Her eyes fell on the rocky riverbank and she was momentarily reminded of Aaryan's explanation to her a few nights below... the reason for why he chose to stop talking to her and her expression hardened, reminding herself of the man's stupidity. Her annoyance only faded when she remembered that the story of that day was also the reason for why Rue told her about the notebook. "Do you know about the shelling that happened in Abureth in 1950?"

Niall nodded. "I do," he said. "There was only one and immediately after that, Rhys and the Crows retreated and left Abureth to protect the civilians."

Thea nodded. "It was part of the reason why the Crow's split to begin with... Orynan used that as fodder to claim that Rhys was incompetent even though all Rhys wanted to was prevent a massacre."

Niall nodded too. "Why do you bring that up?"

"I was right here when the shelling started. On this bridge." Thea said, making Niall raise a brow in surprise. "Aaryan and I were supposed to be walking home from school together but we got in an argument and I left on my own... then I got here and heard the aircrafts and was so intrigued by them that I stopped walking to look at them." She sighed, feeling a little stupid.

Niall chuckled, "well, it's a good thing your home is only a minute away."

"Sure, but it didn't matter because in my stupidity, I didn't realize we were being shelled... even after they dropped the explosives."

Now Niall's eyes widened.

"My brother had seen me leave on my own... he knew how stupid I was, so he came running after me and when he reached me, he threw me over the bridge and jumped in after me only seconds before the shells hit the house right there," she pointed at the home behind them, but to the right of the bridge. Though the home had been repaired and was fine now, if you looked closely, you could still see some of the shrapnel within some of the old brick that they never replaced. "And Theus pulled me up onto the riverbank, right there," she leaned over the bridge a little, pointing to a spot right under it, "and held onto me until the shelling passed."

"How old were you?"

"Eleven... twelve maybe?"

Niall frowned. "That must have been frightening."

"It was," she said. "I was terrified... but Aaryan told me that that day was the reason why he decided to stop talking to me."

His brow rose. "The fight you had with him before you left to walk home on your own?"

"If that was the reason why, it would still not have made sense but it would have been more reasonable than what his actual reason was."

"What was the actual reason?"

She looked at Niall. "He felt like he couldn't protect me," she said, rather sourly as she scowled. "He told me that he couldn't face me because he felt like he had failed me that day by putting me at risk... or something like that. That if Theus hadn't acted so quickly, I would have died and it would have been his fault."

Niall surprised Thea by softening his expression.

"We went from best friends to barely talking," she emphasized, not appreciating that Niall didn't seem to see the severity of Aaryan's stupidity. "Because he's an idiot."

Her emphasis didn't work. Instead of being shocked, Niall chuckled. "That's a very... pre-teen boy thing to do."

Thea sighed loudly.

"You're being too hard on him," Niall said, smiling rather warmly. "You should remember that he was a kid, and kids do stupid things. Especially little boys. When we're that young and naive we want to be heroes to the people we love... and when we find ourselves to have failed, it affects us more than you'd think."

"It's stupid," she said as returned to pouting. However, surprisingly, hearing the words from Niall made her calm down a bit.

"It is stupid," he agreed. "But there's no malice there. Try to remember that. He wasn't doing it to hurt you, he was doing it to punish himself. It was stupid and pointless but he was a little boy with a very singular way of thinking. All of us were like that at some point."

She kept staring at the frozen water, not wanting to agree with Niall but knowing there must have been some truth there. "I didn't expect you to defend the jerk."

"I'm not defending him," he said, amusement in his voice. "I'm just being honest. I was a little boy once too."

"That's hard to imagine."

Niall laughed.

Thea looked up at him, smiling now before sighing. "Let's head back," she said, pushing herself off the railing before beginning to walk in the direction of the house. "Dinner is probably ready."

Niall surprised her by grabbing her arm. "You're coming back then?" he asked when she looked at him. "You're not quitting?"

"Yes," she said, suddenly embarrassed again. "I was being stupid and I'm sorry for that. And I wish you didn't have to come all the way here... it should have been me coming to you to apologize."

Niall smiled. "It's fine. I'm just glad you'll be back."

"Even my brother... Theus, who never wanted me working for you to begin with... thought I was stupid for acting the way I did."

"You did mention that Theus was smart," Niall said, looking amused. "I suppose–"

"Why is Theus smart?"

Thea felt a rush of panic suddenly fill her as she stepped to a side to see Theus walking towards them, hands in his pocket, at the end of the bridge. He looked at her with a relaxed expression, but the second Niall turned, Theus' eyes widened and suddenly, the cold night felt much colder.







After being gone for days, Theus chose the best day to come home for dinner... and sure, Niall's presence brought forth some tension before but now, as they all sat around a table while Thea's mother served everyone, the tension was so intense that Thea felt like she may explode. But Thea's anxiety was nothing compared to what Thea's mother seemed to be feeling, the woman's face so pale that she looked like she would pass out at any moment now.

They were eating relatively quietly, most of the words being exchanged between Niall and Thea's grandmother, who was sitting at the head of the table to the left of Niall and seemed completely immune to the awkwardness of everything.

As they spoke, however, Theus, who was sitting across from Thea, was eyeing Niall in his spot next to Thea without blinking much at all. The staring really only made Thea uncomfortable though because Niall seeming to ignore it for the most part.

Thea figured he was used to such angry glowers.

"The food is delicious," Niall suddenly said, giving Thea's mother, who was sitting across from him, a comforting smile.

Thea figured he was trying to ease the tension, probably seeing how pale and frightened she looked, her eyes constantly flicking between Theus and Niall. However Thea's mother just gave him a tight lipped smile, the fear and panic in her eyes unchanging.

To that, Niall sighed, putting down his fork and knife before looking at Thea's mother with a sincere expression of concern. "Mrs. Rhaanan, you have no reason to be worried. I'm not here to cause any trouble for you or your family."

Thea's mother's eyes widened, a little surprised by his words, his expression enough to send a flash of relief through her own.

"Yeah, Ma," Theus suddenly said, finally looking away from Niall and down at his food before he put a forkful of meat into his mouth. As he chewed, he looked right back at Niall. "He's not here for trouble. He's just here for Thea, that's all. To take her back to the safety of the Capital."

Thea kicked Theus from under the table, seeing quite well that his frustrating and difficult nature had completely knocked away the momentary relief their mother had felt.

"No, really," Theus responded, glowering at Thea for a moment before looking at their mother. "He already knows I'm a Crow."

Thea would have kicked Theus again if their mother hadn't responded with a gasp of horror. Even Thea's father shouted her brother's name as their grandmother put her face in her hands.

"You aren't hearing what I'm saying," Theus continued. "I'm just agreeing with the General here. He's not here to cause any trouble even though he knows I'm a Crow–"

"Theus, that's enough." Thea hissed at her brother as she saw, from the corner of her eye, Niall raise a brow and knot his fingers together.

Theus ignored her. "Troubling us is not what he wants," he continued, keeping his eyes locked with Niall's as the tension between the two men began to grow even more. Frankly, it felt a little electrifying, albeit incredibly uncomfortable. "In fact, what he actually wants is for me to be a traitor to my race, just like him. Isn't that right, General Killian?"

Thea raised a brow, looking at Niall, who was slowly narrowing his eyes at her brother. She then looked back at her brother. "What?"

"He wants me to be a spy on the inside for him," Theus continued. "To spy on Orynan. Right, General Killian? I didn't misinterpret your request, did I?"

"I don't seem to understand what you're trying to do here," Niall said, his voice calm but stern. "If you're attempting to make me seem like a threat to you and your family then why don't you also expand on the rest of the offer I made to you?"

Thea's breathing halted as Theus smirked and continued to eat his food. Her eyes went from him, to Niall, and back to him over and over again. What? When had the two had a chance to converse and make any sort of offers?

"What was the rest of the offer, Theus?" Thea's grandmother asked, rather calmly.

Theus looked at his grandmother, then at Thea, his smirk fading just a little. "He offered to give me a position at the Aiverian National Space Agency."

What?!

Thea's dad choked on his water as her mother slapped her hand over her mouth, tears suddenly leaking out of her eyes. For the first time that night, even Thea's grandmother was speechless, gawking. And Thea... didn't know what she was feeling.

"I offered you an eventual out. From the Crows," Niall said. "To pursue what I've come to understand is your true passion. Yes, there are strings attached, but I find that to be quite fair... yet you seem to be trying to villainize me."

"What are you talking about?" Theus asked, his head cocking slightly to a side. "Who said I was trying to villainize you? I was just trying to calm my worried mother down."

Niall let out a breath, an amused smile on his face. "Oh, really?"

"What better way to let my mother know that you don't mean any harm than to show her what you, the powerful General of the Aiverian Army and the Deputy Secretary of State, would offer to me, a worthless Crow."

Everyone looked confused now, staring at Theus as he ate.

"Of course, I refuse to take such an offer–"

Calamity broke out at the table, Thea's parents and grandmother instantly berating Theus for his stupidity. Thea just stared, gaping, unable to believe her ears.

Quickly, the arguing grew louder with Theus continuing to refuse even considering turning on his Crow brethren as their mother began to fan herself because she was going to faint and their father shook him for his stupidity and their grandmother scolded him for wasting his life away.

Niall stared, shocked at the mess he began to believe he created as Thea closed her eyes, trying to focus.

What the hell was her brother trying to do here?

Was he trying to make Niall look bad? How could he be so stupid? Surely he must have known that her family would react the way they did.

Her face was hot and her heart was pounding and she was confused. She didn't understand what was going on and she refused to believe that her brother could be so stupid. And for Niall to even offer such a thing...

Finally, unable to hear herself think, she slammed her hands into the table and stood, everyone silencing and looking at her, shocked. Even Theus looked surprised, raising a brow.

She kept her eyes on her brother, watching him for a long moment, trying to read him the best she could, before frowning. "Niall. Can I speak to you? Alone."

Niall cleared his throat. "Of course."

She smoothed down her skirt before walking off. "Pa, I'm going to use your office," she said, disappearing into the hallway. She heard Niall excuse himself before following her, and the second he was gone, the noise started up again.

When they reached her father's office, Niall shut the door behind him and watched the pacing Thea with furrowed brows. "I'm sorry–"

"Sorry?" Thea let out a laugh with no humour in it, still pacing. "You're sorry?"

Niall responded by saying nothing. He clearly didn't know what to say.

"Why didn't you tell me you offered him that?" She asked, stopping her pacing and walking over to him with a clenched jaw. She looked... angry... like she was going to hit him.

"What..." a sudden wave of exhaustion flashed across his face as he sighed. They had only just sorted everything out and he was too tired to attempt to smooth things down again. "Thea–"

When she reached him, she grabbed his face in her hands and pulled him down to her, pressing her lips against his. She wasn't thinking... not one bit... but all she knew was that Niall had attempted to help her brother, whether Theus took the offer or not, and she wanted to kiss him. She wanted that more than anything at that moment, and so that's what she did. She kissed him.

There was a brief moment of shock and confusion on Niall's end, eyes wide and staring as Thea kissed him, but it only lasted a second, and when she let go of his face and wrapped her arms around his neck, he held her waist, pulled her close and kissed her back, making her hopeful that maybe he had wanted this too.

Part of her thought that kissing him would clear her racing mind, but of course, it didn't. Instead, her mind was infiltrated with the clean, woody smell of his cologne and the taste of his lips... the whisky that her father had poured for him. His body was warm against hers and the feeling of his hands on her waist was almost painful as their lips moved together, all of it causing her heart to throb so hard in her chest that she could hear it in her ears and feel the blood rushing to her face.

She didn't want him to pull away, and even though he deepened the kiss, she knew he eventually would. She knew that he would soon snap back into his senses and remember that she was his employee and he was her superior and this was inappropriate and unacceptable and whatever words he wanted to use.

But for now, she hoped she could hold him against her a little longer as she pulled her hands to his neck, his skin warm. With her fingers, she could feel his pulse quickening and when he let go of her waist and knotted the fingers of one of his hands in her hair, she figured her own pulse was rising too.

The fingers in her hair were gentle. It didn't hurt and he didn't pull or tug like Adrien had once done. She then realized, as she kissed him, that in the span of their relationship he had touched her hair quite a few times, let it be to pull it out of the way when she threw up or to push stray strands out of her face... and it had never bothered her.

Normally, she hated it when people touched it... ever since Adrien, she hated it.

But as he kissed her, running his fingers through her hair, she realized she rather liked it. She felt comforted... pretty, even. She liked it when Niall touched her hair.

She found herself smiling against his lips, her breathing growing heavier as she lowered her hands from his neck, down his chest... she couldn't believe that there was a time when she didn't trust him... when she thought he was evil and potentially cruel... that he had it in him to maybe even kill her... she was so incredibly wrong... she wanted him so badly... and just as she felt his breathing accelerate too, she suddenly felt a cold shock as he tore his lips away from her. "Thea..." he breathed.

She didn't realize that Niall's back was against the wall until she was forced to open her eyes again and look at him. He was leaning against it as he turned and looked away, his hands dropping to her hips as he tried to catch his breath. "We can't..." he swallowed, hard. "We have to stop."

She closed her eyes tightly. "Because you're the General," she said, rather sadly. "My boss."

"Yes."

She opened her eyes again and looked at him, raising her hands up to his shoulders. "But you're not... you're Niall. Right now, you're just Niall," she sounded rather desperate, though she didn't care.

To that, Niall found himself chuckling, turning to look at her before closing his eyes, dropping his head down and pressing her forehead against hers. "God, I wish it were that easy, Thea."

She watched him as she reached up and took his face in her hands again, not really knowing what he meant by that. However, as she felt the stubble on his warm cheeks and his firm jaw, which he seemed to be clenching, hard, her senses and reality began to hit again.

Then she pulled away, turning and walking over to her father's desk. She put her hands on her own warm cheeks, patting them a little too hard, trying to get a hold of herself and ignore the embarrassment that was rushing into her now that she realized what she had done.

She cursed herself in her head.

Luana was right.

She couldn't control her emotions.

She really couldn't.

"I'm sorry," she started. "I just..." She had to swallow back her pride and ego and sanity just to turn around and face him again. "I just... thank you. Thank you for offering what you did to my brother... whether he took it or not."

Niall nodded, his lips pressed into a thin line as he kept his gaze on her.

"It means a lot to me."

"I understand," he said. "I don't know what he intended with–"

"I think I know," she interrupted, "what his intentions were, I mean."

Niall raised a brow.

"My brother... he may not have seemed like it just now but he's the smartest person I know. There's no way in hell he would have brought this up without knowing that it would have made you look good and him look bad... to both my family and to me," she started. "He would have known that it would have meant a lot to me for you to have done this. He knows it would make me trust you."

Niall seemed skeptical. "He wants you to trust me?"

"Yes..." she nodded, knowing how silly that sounded. "Or, I think at the very least, he wants me to come back to Achlis with you, and the only reason I'd imagine he would go as far as starting a fight in the family for this would be if he thought it'd be better for me to be there... safer, even."

"And why would he think you'd be safer in Achlis?"

"Theus has been gone for a few days, and usually when he's gone that long, it's Crow related," she explained. "He must have gone to see Orynan. And with all that happened in Achlis, and the leak and me being back... I figured it would be about time that Orynan found out that Theus' sister worked for the State... under you... the General of the Aiverian Army and Deputy Secretary of Defence."

Niall narrowed his eyes.

"And I always figured that once Orynan found out... it would be a situation like what happened in Danyo."

Niall nodded slowly, understanding now. "You think Orynan wants Theus to get you to work with them... as a spy."

Thea nodded too. "It's just a guess, but Theus is a genius and what happened in there didn't make any sense... this is the only explanation I can think of. Sure, Theus hates that I work for the State, but what he would hate more than even that would be for me to be working for the Crows. And not because he doesn't believe in the Crows' cause or anything like that... he just knows it'd be much more dangerous for me."

Niall crossed his arms. "If you were to ask him, would he tell you the truth?"

"Probably not," she responded. "That's how much he doesn't want me involved with the Crows. He would never tell me anything in regards to them."

"If that's the case, maybe we should be heading back to Achlis soon."

"Tomorrow," Thea said. "Let's leave tomorrow."

"If you're fine with that then so am I."

Thea smiled awkwardly before nodding. "They're probably still fighting... but we should head back."

Niall nodded too. "Right."

After a moment of hesitating and wringing her hands together, she took a step towards the door but Niall grabbed her arm. "Hold on," he said.

When Thea looked at him, secretly hoping that he would kiss her again, she saw that he was gesturing towards her hair. "Your... hair," he said, clearing his throat. "May I?"

Unsurprisingly, there was no mirror in her father's office, so she simply nodded, not really knowing what was wrong until she felt Niall gently pull two pins from her hair... from the spot at the back of her head where his hands were knotted with her hair only moments ago.

As the strands she had pinned back away from her face fell apart, he ran his fingers through them, fixing what she imagined was a bit of a mess that was originally caused by his own hands, before rather expertly twisting the strands back into place and pinning them down tightly.

Her cheeks were burning as she thanked him, noticing that he refused to look her in the eye, before she opened up the door to return to the dining room.

As expected everyone was indeed still fighting, but judging by the change in expression on her brother's face when he saw her walk back in... seeing his odd look of both defeat and satisfaction at the sight of her, it wasn't too hard for Thea to conclude that she was on the right track with her guess about his intentions.

But really at that moment, as Niall tried to calm her family down by explaining that the offer would remain on the table if Theus ever changed his mind, what was on the top of her mind was trying to hide her face from her brother.

Because as he stared at her, watching her face closely, she knew damn well that he knew exactly what she was thinking.

He knew that she was falling in love with Niall Killian.



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Hello again!

I hope you guys enjoyed the new chapter! haha! Don't forget to vote and comment and follow if you haven't already! <3

As mentioned at the beginning, I wanted to bring up something important here for my readers after reading a comment recently on this story:

At this point, I think you all see that this story features a lot of heavy topics like racism, war, trauma etc, and I wanted to highlight here that this story isn't coming out of nowhere and is not meant to be disrespectful to anyone who has suffered.

To keep things short, I'm a Tamil girl whose family members are mostly refugees from Sri Lanka. They came to Canada to escape the civil war that was going on there - the war between the Sri Lankan government and Tamil people (specifically a militant group called the LTTE). I also have a lot of family members who died during this conflict - family members who were both just civilians and family members who were part of the rebellion. In addition to that, the majority of my family that survived the conflict didn't come out of it unscathed, they suffered dramatically from its effects, including my own parents.

My identity is heavily based on this aspect of my personal history, which is one of the reasons why I chose to do my undergraduate and graduate degree in history. My research during my Master's Degree was actually focused primarily on the effects of the Sri Lankan Civil War on Tamil refugees in Canada.

So, all of that being said, the Little Crow was something that I came up with as a means of expressing myself and what I learned over the years. I wanted it to be an entertaining love story that is entirely fictionalized and not based on real people at all, but at the same time, I wanted it to focus on themes that I came across when doing my degree and also learning more about my own history - the main theme being that there are no real good guys in war (specifically when it comes to soldiers and 'rebels'/'freedom fighters') and oftentimes, innocent civilians are the ones who suffer the most.

That being said, I still 100% want this to be an entertaining story that you all love! I want to make it interesting, but though this is a love story and it is fictional, the themes, words and concepts that I write about here are not topics that I'm throwing around for the fun of it. I don't want people to think that I'm taking advantage of serious topics and disrespecting them. I've done my research and some of the situations in this story is based loosely on things my people have experienced (if you're interested, you can find a lot about the Sri Lankan Civil War, Black July, etc on Google - please just be mindful of your triggers when looking into it).

If any of you have experienced (or have friends/family who have experienced) any sort of suffering like what some of the characters in this story have experienced, I hope you read this story knowing that I, as well as some of my loved ones, have as well. Most importantly, this story isn't meant to take any of that lightly - the use of these topics/concept etc are all very intentional.

So, all of this to say, thank you so much to all my readers! I hope you continue to read and enjoy this story! I also hope you continue to read it with an open mind and I'm sorry for having to make it serious for a moment. Also, I'm 100% not at all trying to garner any sympathy or anything of that sort - I'm a super proud Tamil Canadian and I'm proud of my parents and my family and my history... the people who I know who have suffered from the effects of these kinds of conflicts are the bravest, strongest people I know and I feel nothing but love and respect for them. I just wanted to take this opportunity to make it clear that I'm doing my best to make sure I am not ignorant or irresponsible with these topics.

Thanks for getting through this! Please feel free to let me know your thoughts :) <3

Love, luckycharms <3



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