Irene felt particularly pathetic that it was taking bravery to approach the man. She was in fight-or-flight mode, but unlike when she was on the battlefield, she wasn't wearing her sword and couldn't hide behind her strength or speed.

Instead, she walked towards the Commander because he was looking directly at her.

"Do you need something?" the Commander asked, his voice surprisingly gentle despite the unbelievably stressed-out posture and expression he had just before he noticed her.

However, now that Irene was here, she decided she should press on.

The Commander was under terrible circumstances. It seemed he wasn't able to sleep on the night before he would be subjected to the arduous journey of crossing the eastern mountains. She felt the urge to check on him as if she had the power to make anything better.

At his question, she shook her head and then glanced at the chair across from him. "Do you mind if I sit down? I can't seem to sleep." Either she wanted to add, but didn't want to be assumptive.

The Commander didn't hesitate to be generous. He didn't seem to want to be alone or annoyed at her imposition. After gesturing towards the chair, he insisted, "Of course. Please sit down."

More surprising than having sudden company that night was the fact that her Commander stood up the moment she sat down.

She turned her head in disbelief as a man so much higher than her in rank walked around the counter to retrieve a mug and some of the golden ale. There was an urge to stand up and stop him, but she was also frozen in place and unbelievably on edge.

The Commander returned shortly and placed the mug in front of Irene. He didn't seem inconvenienced despite his expression not being as happy as it normally was.

"I've seen you drink ale before, so I at least know you don't hate it," he said.

Irene's wide, green eyes went to the ale then back to the Commander, who seemed to look at her a bit expectantly. She was embarrassed.

"A commander shouldn't serve his knights," she uttered. "Thank you, regardless."

"I think you know me at least a small amount to know that I don't care about those kinds of rules," Commander Henry reminded her quietly.

He sipped on his own ale as if telling her what she was supposed to do.

His eyes were on her, but when she glanced at him, he dropped his gaze.

Considering she couldn't dare go against his kindness in offering her a drink, and because it was the reason she was there in the first place, the knight decided she should drink and took down a couple of gulps.

She couldn't help that her eyes returned to the Commander once she had pushed the mug to the side. When he wasn't directly interacting with her, he had an unspeakable conflictedness about him.

For some reason, she couldn't bring herself to continue being reserved in front of him or pretending that she didn't notice that there was something the matter. It was more than what transpired that day, but what she witnessed the first time she left her room at night and saw him wearing such a heartbreaking expression that she had to run in the opposite direction.

"Commander…" she began, summoning courage. "Are you okay? I'm not talking about what transpired today. I mean in general."

He swallowed hard as if his throat was dry and she nearly took back her question and apologized, but he said something that surprised her and allowed her a further glimpse into the man's mind.

"Am I that bad at hiding it?" he responded with such a quiet voice that Irene had to lean forward to hear everything he said. "I don't mean to burden others with my personal life."

He didn't meet her eyes again and placed his forehead in one of his hands.

She wasn't expecting him to come clean in such a way. Since he was always on guard—likely because she was always on guard with him as well—she thought that his response would merely pacify her even if she knew it wasn't the truth.

However, her thoughts compounded, she couldn't help wondering if it had to do with the Princess, who was all but confirmed as someone important to Irene's Commander. There were too many bits of evidence for it not to be true.

Even though it wasn't any of her business, it still ate at her.

He seemed so ashamed, she realized she should assure him that she didn't mind because she truthfully didn't. All she wanted was for him to be happy with his life in Chemois.

"Commander, you aren't burdening anyone with anything," she insisted. "We're supposed to be here for you as much as you are for us. Can't you trust any of your knighthood with your true self?"

There was another long pause that caused Irene to want to correct her actions again. It seemed that her concern was more burdening than it was helpful.

Eventually, the Commander spoke up once more.

"I simply want to be a capable leader. I have a hard time believing I'll be seen as reliable if I continue to feel sorry for myself like this. There are things I simply need to get over so that I can keep going forward."

It was such brutal honesty that Irene could only stare for a few moments. Why did she have such an urge to fix everything that was wrong in his life? Was this her strange way of making up for all the times she was hesitant around him before?

She had the thought that her avoidance of him at times made him miserable. Then she recalled that nothing she did would ever affect him in such a way.

He misunderstood her silence that time and quickly added, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said—"

Again, she realized silence wouldn't be good and ended up cutting him off.

"You worry a lot about how others perceive you. Yet even the knights who were resistant about you taking over the knighthood in the beginning have changed their minds. Everyone sees you as a capable leader, Commander," she explained, using the truth in hopes that it would make him happier.

Or perhaps she was inserting herself into the conversation a bit too much. Not only did she want to affect him, but she also knew what it was like to be worried about how others perceived her. How could she not, after appearing before her brothers as a girl all of a sudden? People have been doubting her ever since.

The Commander stared at her in shock for a few moments, and she realized she had been correct in her assessment. They were both in trouble by the way they needed to be validated by others around them, despite how much Irene wanted to pretend that wasn't the case.

In particular, she wanted the complete and total approval by the man in front of her, but she was starting to question if it was merely because she wanted him to trust her as a knight or as a woman...