10. Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten

Bennet ~Day Six~

“So, ready for the next class?”

My lips stretch into a wide smile, my stomach warm from everything that’s happened today. I’m still reeling from watching Quinn use his magic, really use it. Sure, I’ve watched him summon Hellhounds and other minor things but this was something different, something more.

It truly was incredible.

He is incredible.

I was so close to spilling the beans of my feelings. Being stuck in this time loop is starting to turn into the most cruel joke because there’s no one else I’d rather be stuck with, but it’s getting harder and harder to keep my feelings at bay. All I think about doing is pulling Quinn into my arms and kissing him silly. I dream about waking up in his bed instead of my own.

We’re in this little time bubble together yet, I still have to work at keeping him at arm’s length.

“What do you have planned for your advanced class?”

Quinn looks over his shoulder, giving me another grin. Fuck, that grin could bring me to my knees and he doesn’t even know it. The things I could do to keep that look on his face.

“Stop trying to ruin the surprise but I will say, if you were impressed with Fabio, the next thing I have planned is even better.”

“I’m not sure how that’s even possible, but I trust you. I can’t wait to see what you come up with.”

Once Quinn has cleaned up his mat, he stands up, groaning as he stretches his spine. It’s kind of adorable. Or maybe I’ve just got it bad. Yeah, it’s probably the second thing.

“I’ve gotta go grab my other mat and a box of sketchbooks. I know we’re probably just gonna repeat the day but I like giving everything out, just in case,” Quinn explains before darting out of the room.

I get a moment alone. I sit down in Quinn’s seat, letting out a long sigh. How the hell am I going to keep this up? How the hell am I going to get through this time loop without breaking my own heart?

I put my face against my hands, rubbing tiredly at my eyes. Fuck. I feel like I’m drowning with all these feelings. My crush on Quinn was always something I could enjoy at a distance. I liked him but there wasn’t much more than that. A fleeting spark.

Now? Now I’ve actually spent time with him. I’ve been shoulder to shoulder with him for the last couple days. This crush isn’t some fleeting thing any longer. No, now I’m screwed because I’ve been able to see how wonderful he is up close.

It’s easy for me to admit that I have very real, very big feelings for him.

Taking out the timepiece, I stare at it, wishing it somehow gave me an idea of what it wants from us. The arms continue to tick, undeterred by my stare. It ticks, ticks, ticks. The little hearts on the end seem to be taunting me. How fitting for a man with a pining heart be stuck within a time loop with the one his heart aches for?

Jesus, if I hadn’t gotten into the scouting life, maybe I would have been a poet.

“You stare at that thing any harder and it just might burst into flames.”

I startle at the sound of Quinn’s voice, looking up at him guiltily. “Sorry. I just can’t seem to wrap my brain around it. I should know by now that you’re the brains between the two of us.”

Quinn hums and narrows his eyes in my direction. “Don’t do that,” he says right away, setting a big box at the front of the room. “You’re brilliant. You’re capable of doing so many more practical things than I ever could. That’s not even thinking about all the adventures you’ve been a part of. You think I’m smart but you know what they say? If you can’t do, you teach.” He says it with a grin but there’s a weird sadness to his eyes that makes my chest clench.

“Adventuring isn’t for everyone,” I try to say in an encouraging manner. The sadness in Quinn’s eyes was only there for a moment before his smile is back in place.

“Thanks, Bennet.”

Students begin to file in and I sit back, watching Quinn work. He’s a natural teacher and I feel honored that I get to see this side of him. His students obviously adore him. I lean my face against my fist, smiling as Quinn explains what he has planned for this session.

“We’re going to do something a little different,” Quinn says, turning towards the whiteboard. “Your final for the year is going to be casting Magnificent Mansion and having myself and a few classmates come inside and inspect it. Today, I’m going to show you my mansion.”

My stomach flutters with excitement at that. I want to see him cast such a large spell. I want to see inside his mansion. I want to see one of the rooms reflect me in Quinn’s Magnificent Mansion . But that’s far too intimate, right? It’s too much to ask of him to design a room for me made from his magic, pulled from his own mana well. Despite knowing that, it doesn’t stop me from dreaming.

Quinn steps towards the whiteboard, starting to draw floor plans. “The easiest way to conjure your mansion is to have it down pat within your mind. You need to visualize each detail you want to include. I have a few layouts that I usually use depending on who I’m summoning my mansion for. So when I’m with family, I have one design. When I was adventuring, I had a different design. Today, we’re going to come up with a design together.”

That’s so fucking impressive. It takes a lot for a witch to conjure a mansion period, but today Quinn is going to make a design on the fly ? Fucking hell, how am I supposed to not fall for him when he’s showing off just how brilliant he is?

“Okay, so first we’re going to start with a circle room that’s going to be our corridor or entrance,” Quinn says, making a perfect circle on the board. Then he makes five short hallways, like a star. The last thing he adds is one box connected to each hallway.

Turning around, Quinn looks around at his students. “Charlotte, describe a room for me.”

Charlotte bites at the end of her pencil for a moment before speaking. “All pink, obviously. A shaggy pink rug, pink walls, and a cloudy ceiling. No, wait, a skyline ceiling so we can look at the stars. A pink couch, pink desk, pink chairs, and a pink beanbag in the corner.”

Quinn stares at her for a moment before his face cracks into a grin. “I love it! I should have guessed you’d want it to be pink themed.”

He turns back to the board, writing pink into one of the square rooms. He closes his eyes for a moment like he’s trying to visualize the room before he gives himself a nod and turns around once more.

“Okay, how about you, Sorsha?” Quinn asks, pointing at a dwarf sitting in the middle of the room.

“Umm, maybe a weapons room? Something where you can go in and easily restock if you were on an adventure?”

“I love it and it should be easy enough. I’ll just use the room I’ve used in the past when adventuring,” Quinn explains as he makes a note on the map he’s slowly creating.

“Next up, I want to hear from Cynthia.”

A dark elf sits up straighter, biting her bottom lip for a moment before asking. “Can it be something sort of silly?”

“The sillier the better!”

“Can we have a room that’s just cat themed? Maybe a few cats who let us snuggle them?”

Quinn hums happily, writing more notes on the map. I love hearing everyone’s ideas. I love watching Quinn take everything in stride. I’m so thankful he asked me to be a part of his lesson today. “Absolutely. I adore that idea more than you could ever know. A cat room is absolutely necessary in our mansion for today.”

“Alright. This is looking excellent. Let’s do a kitchen for this room,” he murmurs, more to himself then his students. “This room will be Coach Bangel’s.”

My eyes widen as the students all look over at me. “Umm,” I say, feeling my face flush. I was not expecting this. “You’ve put me on the spot.”

Oh god, a room especially for me. This is everything I want, but I have to be careful what I request. I can’t let him see how much I love this, how much it means to me to have a piece of myself in his mansion.

Quinn gives me one of those grins that leave me weak in the knees. “Anything you can come up with, I’ll make it happen.”

“An outdoor garden,” I say after clearing my throat. “How about that?”

“That sounds brilliant. Thank you.”

Quinn turns back to his map, making a couple more notes before taking a step back. He picks up a black marker before taking a step to the right so he can begin to write on a fresh part of the board. After making a large outline, takes a step back and closes his eyes.

Quinn’s palm fills with dark blue light. My hair stands on end as magic fills the air. He breathes in slowly before pushing that breath out, brushing his palm against the center of the outline. I watch, my chest filled with wonder, as a door manifests in front of my very eyes.

Conjuration is a hell of a school of magic.

Quinn stays like that for a long moment, no doubt building the mansion a little at a time. I have no idea if seconds pass by or if it’s closer to hours, but I don’t care. I’m pretty sure I could sit here watching Quinn work his magic all day and never grow bored.

Eventually, the spell comes to an end and Quinn opens his eyes. For just a moment, his brown eyes are bright blue but when he blinks, they’re back to their normal shade. He takes a step back, clapping his hands.

“Who’s ready for a bit of a field trip?”

Everyone rushes to the front of the room and Quinn chuckles, the noise the most wonderful music to my ears. Quinn opens the door and begins ushering everyone inside, one by one, until it’s just the two of us outside.

“I know I already said this, Quinn, but you’re incredible.”

Quinn looks down, smiling at his feet. “You say that, but you haven’t even seen the inside yet!”

“I don’t need to. I already know because I know you.” It’s a bit too close to how I actually feel, but I don’t care. He’s amazing and he deserves to know it. As much as I’d like to say more, I push those feelings as far back, into a tiny box within my head, sealing it shut with industrial super glue. Then I squeeze his shoulder and step through the door.

“This is incredible. It’s so big in here!” Charlotte says, the rest of the class agreeing. There’s amazed murmurs and a few kids brought their notebooks in, taking notes as they look around the circle room that Quinn designed.

The entire room is made of white marble, like the hall of a great castle. The ceiling is domed with intricate fixtures at the center and a chandelier that’s keeping the room bright. There’s five offshoots, just like the drawing on the whiteboard.

It’s impressive work, especially because he did all of this with barely any planning beforehand. Like he explained, usually witches have layouts and rooms planned out in detail before they attempt this spell. Whenever I had a witch in my party, they always made me write everything down and explain in detail what I wanted my room in their mansion to look like. If I’m honest, as nice as it is to sleep in a bed once in a while, I tend to prefer the old fashion way of sleeping beside a campfire under the stars.

“Alright everyone,” Quinn says as he steps in behind us, closing the door. “Which room shall we explore first?”

Everyone speaks at once. Quinn and I look at each other, sharing a soft smile at their excitement. They all want to see a different room first so Quinn asks them to raise their hand depending on which doorway he points at until we come to a consensus.

“Resupply room first,” Quinn finally says, leading the way into the first room. I take up the rear, making sure no one is being left behind.

The hallway is a standard issued hallway complete with the most boring still life paintings on the wall. We somehow all fit in the hall before emerging into the resupply room.

My chest continues to flutter wildly as I look around. This is similar to other resupply rooms I’ve dealt with but there are spatterings of Quinn throughout. There’s a rack of staves, a rack of swords, and a rack filled with bows and crossbows. There are some packs ready to go, shelves of different potions, and a box filled with all manners of rations.

I don’t think I’ll ever be able to wrap my brain around the fact that all of this came from Quinn’s brain. That somehow he was able to pull from his mana in order to create all of this . I’m even more astounded than before and I didn’t think that was even possible!

A few of the students touch the items in this room, testing them, making sure they’re actually real. Of course they are.

“Let’s head to our next room. Shall we do the cat room or the pink bedroom?”

“Cats!”

“Excellent choice,” Quinn says with a chuckle, leading us back through the hallway, through the corridor, and down another hallway. “Prepare yourselves to be amazed! Before I forget, if you’re allergic to cats, you have nothing to worry about as these cats are dander free.”

We enter a room with a large cat themed mural on one of the walls. There are sofas and chairs and so many cats. A lot of the students begin to coo adorably and I find myself sitting in a chair with three cats in my lap. There’s so much purring that it’s a backtrack to the entire room, putting all of us at ease.

“This is the best day ever,” someone says and I look over, finding them laying on the ground surrounded by cats, tears of joy in their eyes. I can relate. I wish everyday could be like this.

That’s when it hits me. For the foreseeable future, everyday can be like this. Everyday could be lived to the max because tomorrow, it’ll start all over again. I won’t be missing out on anything by doing exactly what I want. Right now, I just want to spend time with Quinn, seeing him smile, seeing him enjoy himself with his magic.

We need to do some research, we need to investigate this pocket watch, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have days like today, dedicated to just enjoying ourselves.

The next room we check out is the pink bedroom and it’s just as obnoxious as I assumed it would be. The skylight in the ceiling is my favorite part. Quinn has made the night sky outside shimmer with pink hues as stars sparkle unnaturally bright. The sight is absolutely stunning. Charlotte can’t stop grinning and I understand the feeling completely.

Next, we check out the kitchen and everyone gets a cup of chocolate steamers. The flavor is delicious and I’m once again blown away by the little details Quinn is capable of. How much mana must it have taken to create all of this? Just how powerful is Quinn and how in the world can he go about his day not realizing how powerful he could be?

“Finally, we’re going to head into the outdoor garden,” Quinn says, leading all of us to the final room. He turns back towards me, giving me a little wink before we’re moving. My stomach flutters at the sight and there’s a hint of nervousness nipping at my stomach. This room was designed with me in mind.

We step through the hallway and immediately the scent of wild flowers hits my nose. Warmth blossoms within me and I’m put at ease. I love being outside, I love being outdoors. It’s one of the many reasons I became a scout. I feel at home out in nature.

Sometimes nature is easier than dealing with people.

Okay, more than sometimes.

We’re out on a wood patio. The wind picks up and the scent of wildflowers flows through me, making my hair flit past my face. I push it out of the way so I can continue looking around. There’s seating all around the patio with a fireplace in the middle that someone quickly lights with a sparking spell. All around the patio is a variety of flowers, all swaying along with the wind.

The sun is just rising despite the way it was just starry a moment ago in the pink bedroom. The sun is painting the sky with deep pinks and purples and oranges. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt peace like this.

I’ve always put my all into being a teacher which has kept me here in the city for a long time. I’m only just realizing how much I miss nature, how much I miss camping out in the middle of nowhere, living off the land, and being in touch with my scouting side.

I make a note to get back into the wild as soon as possible. It sparks an idea, one I plan to enact. I want to give Quinn something in return for giving us today. As much as I didn’t understand when he suggested doing something surprising, something completely new this morning, I get it now. I get the need to try new things. I get the consuming feeling of needing to live a little even if tomorrow won’t be a new day.

I sit down on one of the benches and Quinn sits beside me. I nudge him with my arm which earns me one of those little grins I’ve come to enjoy so much.

“What do you think?”

“I think you’ve completely outdone yourself, Quinn,” I whisper, shaking my head. I can’t believe he doesn’t know how amazing he is. “This is everything I hoped it would be while somehow being so much more. It’s beautiful and whimsy. Honestly? It’s absolutely perfect.” There’s a pause before I add. “Thank you.”

Quinn reaches over and squeezes my thigh before standing up. He walks around the area, checking on his students. My head is left spinning, the phantom heat of his hand on my leg leaving me with a shiver.

With a wave of his hand, Quinn puts out the fire in the firepit before leading everyone back into the corridor. We exit through the same door we came in through. The classroom feels weirdly cold after being in the warmth of Quinn’s Magnificent Mansion. Everything feels so gray compared to the colors I just experienced.

Or maybe I’m just being dramatic.

“My favorite thing about the school of conjuration magic is the fact that it’s filled with potential. The only thing stopping you is your imagination. If you can dream it, you can conjure it.”

The class is left with that final benediction. They pick up their sketchbooks and leave for the day. I can hear them chattering about how amazing class was today and they all seem genuinely excited to get further in their studies and start planning their own Magnificent Mansions .

There’s something about Quinn’s words that strike a chord within me. Potential . Potential is all around us. Who’s to say Quinn couldn’t fall for me? Why am I so convinced that he couldn’t have feelings for me?

Maybe I just have to show him how well we fit together. I apparently have all the time in the world. The little hearts on the timepiece are an inspiration to focus on love. I could show Quinn what he means to me and just maybe, with a little luck and a little magic, he might realize he has the potential to have those same feelings right back.

What’s the worst that could happen?