Chương 83: Chapter 80 – Heart to heart.

The brewery had wrapped up for the day. He had asked Seren for a meeting. It would have to be after hours so they were not disturbed. Alric sat at the desk longer than necessary, the charcoal resting against the paper without moving. The first line had been easy. The second less so. This is not your fault. He stared at it, then added another beneath it, smaller. I should have said something sooner, but I only understood recently. The list did not grow quickly.

Every point felt like an accusation, no matter how carefully he tried to blunt it. He rubbed at the page with his thumb, smudging one line until it softened into something less definite. He exhaled slowly. There was no putting it off now. He frowned slightly as he said it, the words feeling thin compared to the shape of the problem. He'd been confused about how to confront this and still was. There had been a time when Hal would knock on his door over something small. A batch behaving strangely.

Something not quite right that needed looking at. Mara would call him to ask questions about barley, wheat. Now those things never reached him. They were solved. Quietly and without him. He missed being involved. There was a soft knock, then the door opened just enough for Seren to step through. She paused when she saw him seated, the papers laid out.

"Mister Alric," she said, closing the door behind her.

"You asked to see me." Alric gestured to the chair opposite.

"Uh... yes, please sit." Alric was immediately struck by how formal she was being. He was not used to this. He felt underdressed and underprepared. She did, smoothing her skirt as she settled, posture straight, hands folded neatly in her lap. Her eyes flicked once to the paper. Then back to him. Alric cleared his throat.

"This is… going to be an uncomfortable conversation." Seren didn't hesitate.

"Am I being dismissed?" He blinked.

"What? No." The answer came too fast to be anything but honest.

"You aren't in trouble or anything," Alric said, putting his hands out and shaking his head. She held his gaze for a moment longer, then blinked rapidly, once, twice, composure tightening back into place.

"I see," she said quietly.

"Then please, go on." Alric leaned back slightly, then forward again, settling somewhere in between.

"Seren, I..." he began.

"I'm not used to you being so formal. Sorry, it caught me off guard." He took a deep breath.

"I'm not a lord." Saying it out loud did not make it any less of a problem. Seren frowned, just faintly.

"I never intended to be treated like one. That wasn't the point of any of this." Her hands tightened together, fingers interlacing.

"I don't believe I've..."

"You haven't done anything wrong," he said, a little too quickly. He slowed himself.

"That's not what this is." He gestured vaguely toward the window, the brewery beyond it. He took another deep breath. This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"I don't hear about problems anymore. Not small ones. Not anything that needs fixing." A short pause.

"I used to." Seren's gaze dropped to the edge of the desk.

"They defer," he continued.

"They wait. They go through you." He exhaled through his nose.

"I spend my days… signing off on things only when Vale allows it. Tasting. Standing at a distance while it all runs without me. You've even said it runs better when I'm not around." That sat between them for a moment.

"I don't know half the issues we're dealing with until they're already solved," he added.

"Or decided."

"I'm a craftsman," Alric said, more quietly.

"Or I was. I've never been the type who wants to come in every season and shout at everyone before leaving." His fingers tapped once against the desk. He paused, trying to find the words.

"This place doesn't feel like mine anymore. I just... I don't even know," he said, initially pointing with his hand before making a vague gesture. Seren's shoulders shifted, just slightly, as if something had landed harder than expected.

"I walk through it and…" He searched briefly.

"I'm not part of it. Just… the reason it exists. Everyone looks away when I walk past. They just keep their heads down." Her head dipped. A tear fell before she could stop it. She turned slightly, wiping it away with the edge of her sleeve, quick and precise, as if it were something to be corrected.

"This is not your fault," he said. She stilled. Alric leaned forward. He put his hands to his temples, looking at her.

"It's the opposite, if anything. You're good at this. Better than I understood when I hired you." She didn't look up.

"I thought I was hiring help," he went on.

"What I actually did was hand you half the place and never check how you were carrying it."

"I believed that was what you wanted," Seren said softly.

"I don't understand why you would employ a maid otherwise." Her voice held, but only just. Seren's hands tightened slightly in her lap.

"When I first arrived, in that first winter," she said carefully, "everything depended on you." She hesitated, choosing her words with precision.

"If you were delayed, things slowed. If you were unavailable, it all just stopped." A small pause.

"I believed that was… not what you wanted. We would go from slow to rush all the time. It would only worsen as we grew." She finally looked up, just briefly.

"So I removed what I could. Organized what I could. Directed what I could. I thought the roof, the… station. All these things were because you wanted to be… separate." Her gaze dropped again.

"I did not realise I was removing you as well. I did not wish to burden you with matters beneath your station." Alric huffed, not quite a laugh.

"That's exactly the problem. I don't have a station, Seren. I like the work. I like the problems, thinking about them, solving them. Take the new indoor cart. That's been the first thing I've enjoyed doing here in months. I'm not sure I will find another." He paused to think for a moment.

"I don't know why I like it. I just do. Solving something, being clever about it, maybe it's something like I want to feel needed, maybe I'm the problem. I just… it doesn't feel like home." She drew a breath, steadier now.

"If I have overstepped," she said, "then I will step back. Or step aside, if that is what you need." Seren paused.

"If you would prefer me to leave, I will do so."

"No. Seren, can we drop the formalities here for a moment? I don't want to dismiss you. I also know you are scared right now. I'm sorry I'm being selfish. We have a problem. I want to solve it so we can keep working together." Seren stared at the floor for a long moment before nodding.

"I apo... Sorry, Mister Alric, I just... I like this job. I like working for you," she said, finally looking up. Alric leaned back, rubbing a hand across his face.

"What I want," he said, "is to know what you want." Seren blinked.

"I'm serious," he added.

"You can run fermentation if you want. Take full control of it. Or manage external letters, people. Or something else entirely if it interests you." He gestured lightly.

"This place is growing. It's not going to get simpler."

"I'd like…" She paused.

"I'd like to keep serving you, as an assistant. Knowing what I know now…" There was a long silence before Alric broke it.

"Are you sure? Do you want some time to think on it?" he asked.

"I am," she said after a moment.

"But… not as before." That made him pause.

"I will not filter everything," she added.

"Only what is necessary. The rest… you should see."

"Thank you." Alric exhaled slowly, some of the tension leaving him.

"Just so you know, Seren, a big part of me doesn't think you were wrong to do it. I'm meant to be in charge, I just… didn't expect this much distance." There was a pause as Alric tried to find the words.

"Seren, you know this is a problem because I am strange, right?" Seren finally looked up at him with a small smile and nodded.

"I'm the strangest you've ever met, right?" he added with a small grin of his own.

"I need your help. There are a lot of things I just don't understand. This whole problem could have been stopped if I'd explained this at the start, you know. I still need your help."

"We're going to run into many problems, I think," she said.

"Soon." Seren nodded.

"The new buildings?" he added. Seren scoffed.

"Mister Alric, you earn how much, you've become how visible to the city, and you are still single?"

"Uh…" was about all he could manage, after a pause.

"We'll have to deal with that as it comes."

"Yes," she agreed.

"Badly."

"We'll need people just to support the people," Alric said, trying to steer the conversation back to anything other than his romantic life.

"Cooking. Cleaning. Managing the rest so the workers can actually work." Seren nodded as if that were a perfectly normal sentence. Clearly she was already thinking ahead.

"I will begin arranging it," she said. The room settled into something quieter than before. Not resolved, but at least for now, understood. For now, that was enough.