Chapter Text
Hardly an hour from Lyrias, the consort is forced to bring the carriages to a halt. The eldest prince has fallen into a deep slumber, the sort only the smallest of babes can manage, and his brother, loud and fussy, is sent off with the rest of his mother’s entourage to preserve the quiet. Shirayuki, of course, is asked to stay.
Haki cradles her son in her arms, unmoving save for the hand that brushes over his cheeks, down over his chest, pausing to marvel at tiny fingers. Like this, swathed in a half-dozen blankets, she is a vessel for wonder; her mouth parts to match his, a ghost of a smile lingers at the corners of her lips. When they met all those years ago at Lyrias, Haki had gleamed upon her pedestal, an idol of womanhood. Now the months between them have taken the shine from her image, but yet she is better with her imperfections. She is earthly now, instead of ethereal, but looking at her child she is also incandescent.
But even in the calm of this moment, Shirayuki tenses. It is not in the consort’s nature to leave things as they lie. Haki’s lips part in a breath, and Shirayuki braces. It was too much to hope for that she would say nothing.
“Would you like to hold him?” Shirayuki’s shoulders slump with relief. That is not the question she was expecting.
“I –” She has held the princes before, but only as a brief waypoint on the way to another’s arms, not to – not to enjoy them herself. “Yes, if it wouldn’t wake him.”
Haki leans toward her, and in a move far smoother than Shirayuki expects, he is in her arms. It’s a surprise how weighty he is, despite his small size. He’s warm too, a little ember in a swaddle, warming her from the outside in. There’s something about his mouth as well, something in the way it gaps open just so that is calming, steadying. His small breaths are deep and nasally, the closest thing to a snore a creature so small can come.
It’s strange holding him; she’s still, so carefully still, but even so she can feel all the ways she is falling.
She lowers her face, letting her hair hang in a long, velvet curtain as she touches her forehead to his. It is as if they are in their own little world, him and her, something special between the two of them.
“You will be so loved, little one,” she whispers to him. “You are so loved.”
“Are you giving him his blessing?” Haki asks, her voice loud and amused in the silence. “I’ve heard that is what witches and godmothers do.”
Shirayuki flushes, pulling back. “I was just telling him things.” She permits a sly smile to curve her lips. “Secrets.”
“Nothing too scandalous, I hope.”
“No.” He has little hair, but what is there is downy and fair, fluffing around her fingertip as she runs it through the tuft. “Not at all.” The babe stirs, worming deeper into her arms. “Have you named them yet?”
Haki settles against the bench with a sigh. “No. It is tradition in Lyrias to wait for the first month to pass before a child is named, and you know how my brother feels about tradition. I suppose we’ll make a decision once we have all returned to Wistal.”
Shirayuki’s focus catches on the ‘we’. It is strange to hear Izana be spoken of as a part of a unit, a pair, but it’s – nice. It sounds like –
Like a beginning.
“You must be calling them something?” she presses, running a finger over the body’s round cheeks. “You can’t just be saying that one or this one.”
Haki laughs, color high on her cheeks. “No, I’m embarrassed to say I’ve found myself following your knight’s lead in that. In my defense, His Chubbiness and His Fussiness are terribly apt.”
She stiffens, her breath catching in her throat. She had thought herself prepared to think about Obi, but it’s as if she’s scraped a scab off on accident. Her raw emotions well just under the surface, ready to spill.
The consort does not miss it. “Shirayuki.” Haki leans forward, hand hovering just above her knee, unsure of whether comfort will be welcome. “If there is something –”
“No, there’s –” She shakes her head. “I didn’t know Obi had gone to see them.” On his own, without her.
“Yes, at night!” Haki hurries to clarify. “We have kept up that tradition. Even with my warriors without, they still find ways to keep me up at all hours. And he is good with them.”
She does not allow herself to think of him holding the small princes, bent over to whisper mischievous secrets into the delicate shells of their ears. She does not think of him with a babe sprawled on his breast, both lightly dozing in the lamplight. She does not think about it because there’s something about it that pulls at her, that tears at the edges of something and leaves her bereft.
Shirayuki prefers not to know what it is.
“Ah,” she says instead, forcing herself to sound casual, not – not wounded. “I didn’t know,”
“Shirayuki –”
The carriage slows, and one of the handmaidens returns, the other prince tucked in her arms. “My apologies my lady, but His Highness –”
The babe wails so loud it is clear what he wants. “Of course, of course,” Haki huffs, taking him. “His Fussiness always did have convenient timing. Come, I’ll feed him.”
Shirayuki sags back against the seat in relief. When she hazards a glance up at the consort, the look Haki turns on her promises the conversation is far from done.
*
For two days she escapes the topic, not due to any skillful evasion on her part, but rather because the addition of two babes with hardly a month between them drags their pace to a crawl. Much of their day is spent passing the two between carriages with all the ease of an amateur juggler, trying to preserve the quiet for one only for the other to insist on immediate attention. When they finally arrive at the inn, Shirayuki is bone-weary, unable to do much else than collapse onto her bed.
She must doze for a handful of moments, for between one blink and the next the evening sky has gone fully dark.
Whatever small bit of rest she gleans is enough to get her to shed her outer layers, stripping down to just her chemise before slipping under the covers. The curtains lay open, letting in the moon’s light; it settles as gossamer sheet upon her bed, illuminating the shape of her legs beneath the covers in sharp relief, the rest of the room left in deep shadow.
It’s that which dredges up the memories of a solid warmth pressed into her side, of a heavy weight thrown over her belly, of a huff of air caressing the skin of her neck and sending heat between her legs –
She bolts upright, eyes painfully wide. It’s the room. It’s the very same – it was here that –
I want to hold you. I want to feel you against me. I’m tired of all this space between us.
– her stomach churns, it roils. His hand skims ups her arms, his fingers threading through hers –
I want to touch you like I did the night of the ball. When my finger brushed your neck and you shivered.
– she can’t stay here. She can’t be here. How can she sleep when –
I want to kiss you. His fingertips grip her pelvis so hard she thinks it might bruise. Here.
– when she still can feel his hands on her.
Shirayuki throws back the covers, nearly kicking them off the end in her haste. She hardly knows where she is going until she is there, swinging the door open. The lights are dimmed, but Haki is awake, dressed for sleep as she nurses one of the princes on her bed.
“Why, Shirayuki,” she drawls, “is something the matter?”
“I don’t – I don’t wish to bother you,” she pants, her knuckles white where she grips the doorknob. “It’s just that I need – I would like to switch rooms.”
“Is there something wrong with it?”
It’s hard to concentrate when her lips still tingle, when her mind repaints that night with a different ending. Her skin flushes under the phantom pressure of his hands, and she curses the betrayal of both her body and mind.
“No,” she grounds out through gritted teeth, staunchly not wondering what it would feel like to have his lips on her neck. “I just…can’t fall asleep.”
“Perhaps there is something on you mind?” The consort’s face is too mild, too innocent, and that is when she knows. It is no mistake that she finds herself in this room tonight.
“I find it is quite difficult to sleep restfully if there something weighing heavily on me.” Haki continues, so helpful. “If you need to unburden yourself,” her smiles sharpens to a predatory point, “I would be happy to lend an ear.”
“I think,” Shirayuki’s mouth pulls into a thin line, “I’ll be fine.”
“But are you sure?” The consort smells blood on the water. “I’d hate for you to lay awake all night, bothered by your thoughts…”
Even now she feels the phantom pressure of hands running down her side. “I’ll take my chances.”
*
The closer they draw to Wistal, the more palpable Obi’s absence becomes. She lingers at the stables in the evening, until she remembers there is no grinning knight to walk her to the inn, to provide easy conversation as she turns in for the night. On horseback, she keeps craning her neck, expecting a warm presence by her side, a brush of knees and a parting quip. When she talks to herself at night, as she has since childhood, mulling over her notes aloud, but it isn’t until now that she notices how she pauses, waiting for another voice to join hers.
Shirayuki always thought herself accustomed to being by herself, but when her room feels too silent at night, she wonders if she has ever truly been alone these past six years.
*
Cherry trees sprout along their route, bloomless in the winter snows. The ghostly grip of hands warms her thighs, and she drops her eyes to the churning slush of the road to quell the heat pooling between her legs. Phantom lips press against the pads of her fingers; she has to rub her hand against the smooth fur of her cloak to be rid of it.
A good friend would be happy for him. And she is more than that, so she should be – more. Elated, maybe.
He has never been more at ease than those years at Lyrias; she would often cross the training yard when he was with the guard, her eyes picking out his broad back from the crowd, watching as his body demonstrated proper form. He used to slouch, to hunch his shoulders to make himself small, but in Lyrias he stood tall, his body filling out its bones more every day because he –
He had no one to make himself small for. He belonged.
In their first months back at Wistal, she missed the sight. Instead of lying straight his shoulders would round as he took his place beside Zen, seeming so much smaller and slighter next to Mitsuhide. Beside her he would unfurl himself, or next to Ryu – already so tall at his age, even now he might have surpassed Obi – he would stretch to his full height, unapologetically taking up the space he filled.
He would be happier at Lyrias. Beside Makiri there is space for the man he has become, for the man he may yet be.
Perhaps even the husband.
Her heart twists in her chest. This is what’s best. It is.
“Enough.” Haki’s voice startles her. The burn across her palm alerts her to the fact that she’s holding the captain’s bedpost in a death grip, her knuckles white with the effort. She lets go, but the carvings still crease her palm in relief, white lines like old scars.
“I have been patient, Shirayuki.” Haki sits up in the checkpoint’s bed, a mountain of pillows propping her upright. “I won’t push, but – but something is not right with you.”
Shirayuki drops her gaze, tracing where a line gouges through the pad of her thumb. “I’m fine. There isn’t anything to worry about.”
Haki sighs, and she glances up to see the hurt on her face, and – and of course there is, of course. How often had Shirayuki held her hair when the consort laid sick on the floor, or listened to the stories of her childhood while she sat up late at night, hearing her few memories of her mother? How many evenings had they spent just like this, hearts bared?
Haki stares down at her hands for a long moment. “I wish you would talk to me.”
How had she never noticed that they had become friends?
“I don’t –” She bites her lip, nervous. “I don’t know how to start.”
“Start wherever you need you,” Haki says softly, drawing Shirayuki down beside her. “We’ll make sense of it later.”
It’s hard to know where to begin, to know what she should even say. She trusts Haki, she does, but that doesn’t mean –
That she wants to explain everything. Phantom hands fist in the material of her dress, and she wonders if she even could. She hadn’t thought, not really, about what she wanted, she’d just known she wanted her hands on him, her lips pressed against his, trailing over his skin –
“We kissed,” she blurts out finally, though the explanation feels…incomplete.
Haki merely arches a brow. “Well, I did catch you in his bed.”
“No!” Her cheeks heat painfully. “Not – not then. We just slept t – slept in the same bed! There wasn’t…” She thinks of his hand sliding hotly over her side, the way she tapped at his throat and wanted. “Nothing, um, happened. In the bed.”
The consort’s stare is impossibly flat. “Is that so? So where, exactly, did this kiss take place?”
She resists the urge to put her hands to her cheeks and mumbles her answer.
Haki stares. “I’m sorry, what was that?”
“The library,” she says, louder. “At Lyrias.”
Her mouth gapes open for a moment before bending into a wide grin. “Really. Did you two cozy up to your beloved books? Perhaps find a new use for those sturdy study tables?”
Her face is so painfully hot that she can’t find words to speak. Haki’s jaw drops.
“Not really?” She stares, wide-eyed. “I could believe it of him, but you –” She must catch the look on Shirayuki’s face, for she abruptly changes tack. “Is that what’s upset you?”
She shakes her head, feeling light-headed. “No, it’s – I liked that.”
Her brow furrows. “Then why…?”
“Because…” She wanted more than he would give. “He’s going to stay.”
“At Lyrias?” Haki stares at her, uncomprehending. “Did he say that?”
“Makiri offered him a position. Much more than I can pay.”
“Shirayuki.” The consort sounds somewhere between amused and exasperated. “I don’t think he cares about payment.”
“He would if he was thinking of – of having a family.”
“A family,” Haki deadpans. “Obi? Without you?”
“Yes, he can’t just – follow me around forever.” Her hands fist in her lap, already feeling the space his absence leaves beside her. “He’ll want to have his own life, with his – his own…” The breath she takes is not even. “With someone else.”
“With –” Haki shakes her head. “Shirayuki have you talked to Obi about this?”
“No, of course not.” It’s hard enough having this conversation with Haki, and she isn’t – Haki isn’t Obi. “I just…know there are options for him. Good options.” Better ones.
“I don’t think –” She stops herself, sighing. “You need to talk to Obi about this. I can say that he has never given me a reason to think he would prefer…other options.”
Shirayuki doesn’t quite know what to say, her mind a tumult.
“So this is what you’re upset about,” Haki says finally. “That he has other options.”
“No, I’m glad. He’s always been worth so much more than he thinks, and –” She breathes. “I’m happy for him, just –”
“Then what are you upset about?”
She wants to snap back at her, to lash out, because – as if she had not been wrangling with the same question. He’s her friend before all else, she wants him to do well, she wants him to be happy, but –
Why can he not do it beside her?
“Oh,” she breathes, knowing.
Haki’s face wrinkles with concern.
“Shirayuki?” She reaches out for her.
A knock falls swiftly on the door before it opens. “Your Majesty?” one of her handmaidens calls out softly. “Sir Obi has just arrived in the yard –”
Shirayuki’s heart seizes. She can’t see him now, she can’t.
Haki’s fingers band around her arm, keeping her in place.
“Thank you. Bring him here when he is decent.”
Her maid leaves, and Haki twists to face her. “Don’t run.”
“I can’t,” she wheezes. “I can’t see him. Please –”
“You’ll have to face him sometime,” the consort warns. “You’re staying in the same checkpoint. Unless you mean to ride all night to…” Her mouth twists in displeasure. “Shirayuki, no.”
“Please.” She loves him, she loves him, and if she sees him now –
She would tell him. “I can’t talk to him. Not now.”
Haki sighs, releasing her arm. “Fine. Be safe. If something happens to you, who do you think your knight will blame?”
*
The ride to Wistal is long – longer than Shirayuki remembers – and somewhere around the second hour the frenzied edge to her flight fades; the last dregs of her adrenaline no longer able to fuel her frantic pace. Without her pulse pounding in her ears or her heart fluttering against her chest, it’s hard to keep her thoughts at bay, to keep herself from feeling ridiculous.
She leans over the long neck of her mount, breathing hard into its mane. It’s foolish that she is here, a grown woman having run because – because she loves a man. That is what it boils down to: she loves him, and she is scared.
Her hand wipes at her brow; it comes away wet. By now he will know that she is gone, that she has run yet again, but – but he deserves better than this, than a girl who can’t face him and hold her tongue at the same time. It was foolish of her to go, but it would have been more foolish still to have faced him, to have laid her feelings bare before him. The last person who needs to be burdened by her is Obi.
She’s already done enough of that.
Her breath huffs out in a weary laugh. Isn’t this typical? A few kisses and suddenly her heart is topsy-turvy. She might as well be eighteen again, leaning against a tower wall and wondering what a prince could want from a common girl. Only now it is not some – some shocking turn of events, but instead something she has courted for weeks. Months, probably. Something she asked for, as if she knew what it meant –
She shakes her head. Now is not the time to be thinking about this. It’s far too late to turn back.
The only thing she is sure of is that he’ll come for her. She needs time before that, needs rest probably, but she’s at a dearth of both.
The only way to go is forward. She digs her heels in, and hopes the miles might at least give her some ease.
*
Shirayuki trudges up the Poet’s Gate steps just as the sun begins to rise over the castle walls. Her legs wobble from the ride, settling into a whole-body ache the longer she is on solid ground. She longs for the comfort of her own bed, even though she doubts she could rest even if she dropped onto it now. Her mind is a tumult, churning over a thousand threads of thought, each one cursing her for her own foolishness.
“Lady Shirayuki.”
Well-polished boots settle in her vision, and her eyes trail up, up, following long legs and slender torso until they end at the King of Clarines’s faintly amused smirk.
His eyebrow arches in question. “We did not expect to see you back at Wistal so soon.”
This is exactly what she does not need right now, but there’s no real way to tell a King that, no matter how familiar they are.
“And,” Izana drawls, his face pulling tight, “without my wife at that.”
“Haki is well.” She drags herself up the last few stairs until she comes level with him. He towers over her, as always, but she feels better standing on even ground. Ceding any sort of advantage to Izana is a beginner’s mistake. “She’ll be here later.”
An expectant silence stretches between them, and were she any less tired, Shriayuki would fidget under his gaze. As it is, she considers it an accomplishment to remain upright.
Izana makes an inquisitive noise. “Is that all you –?”
“Don’t you ever get tired?” Shirayuki clutches at the strap of her satchel; it’s the only thing keeping her grounded.
His eyebrows inch toward his hairline. “Tired?”
“Of the game you play.” She meets his eyes, and, for a bare moment, the King flinches. “I am so, so tired. I have no patience left for being played with. Could you not just,” she sighs heavily, “could you not just consider it a personal favor to leave me alone and tell me where Akaibara is? Didn’t you say you…you owed me?”
She wonders, in the silence that follows, whether she has just made her first advanced mistake.
“On her honeymoon,” he answers after a long moment, the words stilted. “My brother and his wife aren’t due to return for at least a fortnight.”
She nods absently. Her lack of sleep makes her memory fuzzy at the edges. “Right. I…knew that. I just…” She shakes her head, but it cannot clear the fog.
“I believe Lady Seiran takes her breakfast at this hour,” Izana supplies, oddly helpful. “I know my dear sister left most important matters in her care.”
“Right.” Shirayuki sways a little on her feet. “I think I remember she said she would, um, leave things with Kiki.”
“Yes.” She wishes she were more lucid; she can’t recall another time she’s seen Izana so unnerved, and it feels wrong to not be enjoying it. “Perhaps you should visit her now. I believe Lord Seiran might still be abed, if that influences your decision any.”
She plods past him, too tired for suspicion. “Right. Thank you. I’ll…do that.”
“Shirayuki.”
He stops her with a word. She’s too tired to do anything but turn her head over her shoulder.
“Do take care.” When she meets his gaze, she finds it – warm. “My wife would be most upset were you to fall ill. And,” he looks as if the next words physically pain him to say, “Please know that I do not consider our debt…repaid. Not in the slightest.”
“You don’t actually owe me anything,” she tells him, because she can’t – she won’t play this game, not even with him. “I would never let anything happen to Haki.”
“I know.” He comes to her, touching her shoulder briefly. “That is why I owe you.”
He passes her, leaving her alone in the hall. She stares at where he left, suddenly thankful that she did not waste the rest of her life suffering through the maze of her brother-in-law’s designs.
*
Shirayuki does not expect to feel so…odd when she arrives in the east wing, as if she has stumbled past her bedroom door in the dark and tried to open another. It feels stranger still that Kiki does not meet her at the door, but instead a maid who offers to show her to the solar, where Lady Seiran is breaking her fast.
The warm light of morning shines through the windows, painting the room in brilliant golds and reds. The sun’s glow seems to linger around Kiki, winding through the silky gold of her hair and brushing the soft blush of her skin, until she seems to radiate with her own brilliance. Shirayuki’s greeting evaporates on her tongue at the sight of her.
“Shirayuki,” Kiki says warmly, a corner of her lips canting into a smile. “You’ve come home.”
Not yet. “Yes.” Shirayuki sits beside her, awkward in the stiff-back dining chair. It feels too formal, too distant. “It’s good to be back.”
“Are you hungry?” she asks. Shirayuki means to shake her head, but a steaming plate of eggs and sausage is set before her before she can. The scent of it makes her stomach turn over and growl.
“I suppose I am,” she laughs weakly, laying a napkin on her lap. “It was a long ride.”
“We didn’t expect you until this evening.” Kiki fixes her with a shrewd look. “You didn’t ride through the night, did you?”
“Ah…” Shirayuki grimaces, fishing for a change of topic. “How are you feeling, Kiki? You look well.”
Kiki’s hand stills, a slice of grapefruit slotted onto her spoon. Her eyes narrow, but her expression eases back into a smile a moment later. “Fine enough, I suppose. After Her Majesty’s troubles, I have very little cause to complain.”
“No nausea?” Shirayuki eyes her shrewdly, but she hardly has little more than a small rounding of her abdomen, visible only by the way Kiki’s gown clings to her. “You’re comfortable?”
“Comfortable is a relative term,” she says with a small flash of teeth. “But my worst complaint so far is that all my pants must be let out for me to fit in them.”
That explained the dress, at least. “I’m glad to hear it.”
She relaxes, allowing herself to take a bite of breakfast. The eggs are fluffy, melting in her mouth, and she’s surprised to find how hungry she is. It’s been nearly twelve hours since her last meal, she realizes, with no sleep to ease the pains.
“We though Obi would be with you,” Kiki says with an expectant sort of archness. Shirayuki coughs on her sausage.
“What?” Her heart thrums painfully beneath her ribs. “I don’t – he was coming later. He had…business in Lyrias.”
She doesn’t let herself consider what kind, but it does not quell the ache that burns in her chest.
Kiki hums, curious. “Is that so? He wrote only few days ago to say he meant to ride hard for the capital.” She eyes her so pointedly, Shirayuki can’t help but wonder what else Obi wrote in his letter. “I thought he would have caught up with you by last night.”
Her smile wavers. “We must have just missed each other.”
“Shirayuki.” Each word is carefully honed to a point. It is so easy to forget blades are not her only weapon. “I deserve better than to be lied to. Not by you.”
Words sink heavy on her tongue, until the weight of it is too great to keep inside anymore. “I love him.”
It is so strange to say the words aloud. The way her mouth fits around them is awkward, unpracticed.
It doesn’t, however, taste wrong.
“And that is…” Kiki’s eyes are fixed to her, as if she might run if she doesn’t keep her pinned beneath them. “Bad?”
“I just – if I see him I’ll say something, and –” Her throat stings, hardly able to squeeze out the words. “I can’t tell him.”
Kiki’s brows draw together in confusion. “Why not?”
“Because…” Her breath wheezes embarrassingly out of her lungs; she has to clutch the tablecloth to get a grip on herself. “He’s only going to leave me.”
“Shirayuki.” Her voice is as sharp and sudden as a whip crack. “Why on earth would you think that?”
“He’s been offered a job at Lyrias. More than I can pay, and there are –” she takes a long, deep breath, “other attractions there as well. I know we’re friends but that’s no reason for him –”
“Enough.” Kiki’s hands are white where they are clenched around her silverware. “That is – enough. You have to –” She hesitates, laying her hands flat on the table with deep sigh. “Shirayuki, you must stop using what Zen had to do as an excuse.”
She stares. “I wasn’t –”
“You were.” Kiki’s eyes are too sharp, as always. “I know Zen’s decision came as a shock to you. And in that I must admit that I was not – I was not enough of your friend. Don’t think I have forgiven myself for that. You, of all people, did not deserve to be surprised by such a thing.”
Shirayuki shakes her head, eager to assure her, but Kiki holds up a hand.
“No, I don’t – I don’t speak enough. I know that. And it is far past time that I have with you.” She sighs, her hands smoothing over the tablecloth. “It wasn’t fair, what Zen did. Whether it is right or not, only time will tell, but it was not fair to you. It was never fair to you,” she admits, “to be pitted against his country. Had it been for anything less than Clarines, nothing could have persuaded him to put you aside.”
Shirayuki’s laugh is weak, tremulous. “I’m sure Izana could have found something.”
Kiki cocked her head, her grin bitter. “No, I don’t think he could. And I don’t think he would have either, had things not seemed so dire.”
She doesn’t know what could have been so dire for Clarines, but there is some comfort that Kiki found Zen’s reasons compelling as well. That the matters he tended to were not small.
“I know that to be set aside so suddenly, with so little explanation – it hurts.”
The last words seems torn from her, and Shirayuki cannot help but remember the words Mitsuhide had said a much younger Kiki had spoken – until now, all I had was myself –
“But you cannot let that rule you.” Kiki’s gaze is back on her, as bright and deep as it ever was. “Do not – do not let it build a wall around you, where you protect yourself from disappointment by expecting it. You are not a woman that is easily set aside, not in Zen’s heart, and certainly not in Obi’s.” She sniffs. “Not for something as cheap as coin.”
An easy thing to say for a woman who has never had to worry over it. Shirayuki knows better than to say so.
If Kiki sees her skepticism, she does not say so, instead commenting, “It is too bad that you did not arrive together.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. I had something to show the both of you.”
Shirayuki blinks. “The both of us?”
“Yes.” Kiki stands, walking around the corner to lift something off a table. When she comes back into the room, Shirayuki can only gape.
“You see,” Kiki says with a smile more tooth than toothsome, “your plant flowered while you were away.”
*
The bloom is bright, orange and variegated as the sunset, split into three plumes; another three petals are vividly blue, joined together to make a sharp point, curved up like the tilt of an inquisitive head. The petals arch, as if along the curve of a back, and it looks as if it is nothing more than an exotic bird perched on a branch, poised to take flight. It’s beautiful, it’s complex, it’s –
“Strelitzia reginae.” Ryu’s gaze flicks back up to hers for a bare moment. “A bird of paradise. I thought it might be that.”
She feels her face heat with a flush. “Are there any orders I can help with?” Ryu lets her step past into their office. “I just got back and –” The room feels wrong for a moment, askew almost, and she realizes Obi’s – the window is closed. “– I could use something to do with my hands.”
His eyes narrow. “When was the last time you slept, Shirayuki?”
Too long ago. “I just arrived this morning,” she says instead.
He stares, mouth pulling flat. “You should rest. It’s a long ride here from –”
“I –” She shifts the pot on her hip. “I can’t. Not yet.” She can’t be left alone with her thoughts, not now. “Please, Ryu.”
He glances from the flower to her face. “You can grind herbs. And only if I check them after.”
Relief suffuses her. “Thank you.”
She returns to her desk, and for a moment she considers setting the orchid on it, but it does not feel right, no matter where she sets it. Frustrated, she turns, placing it on the sill. The room feels right again.
Ryu clears his throat. “Shirayuki.”
She turns to find him standing awkwardly between their desks, his hands fisted by his side. He trembles when he meets her gaze. “The window.” His eyes are bright, earnest, and blindingly blue. “It’s Obi’s. No one else should sit there.”
Her brow furrows in confusion. “Has someone else –?”
“No,” he snaps, impatient, just as he had as a younger boy. “I mean to say – he belongs here. With us. To us.” He scowls. “Not anyone else.”
Shirayuki can’t help but stare. “I – I don’t –?”
He huffs out a breath irritated. “I like that it’s the three of us. Just the three of us, Shirayuki. You, me, and Obi. It should stay that way.”
She begins to understand the shape of what he’s trying to tell her, if not its form. “I don’t think – I don’t get to make that decision, Ryu. Not by myself.”
His mouth rucks up into a scowl. She reaches for him, sliding her much smaller hand into his, and it eases.
“But for what it’s worth,” she starts, her cheeks flushed, “I think that’s what I want too.”
He watches her carefully, so carefully, before dropping his gaze with a nod. “All right.” He pulls back his hand with a gentle reluctance. “You can do your work now.”
She allows herself a smile. “Thank you.”
She picks up her pestle, and loses herself in the steady rhythm of herb grinding.
*
Only a few hours later, Ryu removes the implements from her hands and sets them on the desk.
“You’re done,” he says firmly, gently pressing her hands to the wood to underscore his point. They ache, and she realizes that her palm has been rubbed slightly raw where she gripped the pestle. Softer, he adds, “Get some rest.”
Shirayuki wants to protest. She wants to remain lulled by the motion of pestle grinding against mortar, to keep herself separate from the stressful emotions outside her small office, but her vision is blurring with fatigue. As reluctant as she is to return to her rooms, to be left alone with only her thoughts, she is tired – exhausted, really, and if she must face the consequences of her flight tonight, she would rather do it with her full faculties.
She steps over the threshold, and it’s a mistake.There is not a single corner of this room that is not marked by his slow, silent siege on her heart.
The bed, where she had met his eyes for a moment longer than she had meant and her curiosity tipped into attraction; where later he had unclasped his collar and the first stirrings of need had settled in her. The balcony, where she had once worn a dress heavy with responsibility and told him he gave her strength; where later she wore a dress as airy as dreams and let him thread stephanotis into her hair, savoring every touch. The desk, where he had pulled her braid and teased her about her many suitors, whose surface now sat cluttered with books she had not yet returned to the castle’s library in her haste to head north.
The most egregious of them being the thick tome of flower language she had meant to return after she finished with Katashi. With the wedding and then the last-moment trip to Wilant, her days had been too harried to manage even a quick stop to drop it off. There hasn’t even been time for –
For later.
Perhaps that had been for the best. Perhaps it would have been better to never start at all.
She sets the plant in its corner by the balcony, though no matter which way she turns it, it seems – wrong. Things are different now, she realizes, the bloom swaying obviously. She can’t go back and…and make them different. She’s not sure she would want to if she could.
She stands, and the bloom bobbles again, smacking against her hand. There are other buds as well, straining at the seams. What had seemed for so long to be the end is now only the beginning.
Its silky petals brush over the back of her hand. Obi had known the whole time what this was. He has seen its plaque six years ago in a shop and thought of her. It had not just been a whim of the moment, but a gift years in the making. A message, posted seven years ago, reaching her only now.
She stops, blinking. A message.
Opening up the book sends a small burst of dust into the air, but she waves it away, bending over the page. Bird of Paradise. The plate hardly does the actual flower any justice.
Her finger traces over the words. Magnificence, it says, excellence and success. Her mouth pulls into a frown. Not quite what she thinks he meant. Joy through challenges and successes alike. Closer, certainly. Optimism towards the future.
A knot lodges in her throat. He had always told her he admired how she always faced forward, her path as straight as an arrow. How she always saw the silver lining in every storm cloud.
Freedom, she reads, her eyes stinging. Desire for travel.
It is worse, that he knows her so well. So much worse.
She begins to close the book, when she catches the last. Faithfulness in romance.
Her mind spins. Was that a – a blessing? A wish for her and Zen, or –
Or a hope for something else?
She shakes her head. No, six years ago, all he had felt for her was friendship. Perhaps after Zen had set her aside, he had begun to see her differently, but –
She remembers his chest pressed so intimately against hers. You thought about this. Here?
Oh, Miss. His voice is so low, so laden with wanting it makes her breathless even in memory. It was the only thing that made the library bearable.
He had wanted her before, years ago, at Lyrias. But certainly – certainly not so long ago as that. Not since he got her – no. If he had, then –
Then he would –
He must –
She shakes her head. He hadn’t ever courted her, had never given her any sort of –
Her gaze drifts to the balcony.
In a moment she is tearing through pages, fingers frantically scraping down paper before she finds what she is looking for.
Stephanotis, it says, the entry hardly more than a tiny blurb. The plate is lovely, and she remembers catching sight of them in the mirror, laced so delicately through her hair, so purposefully. Surely it was just aesthetic; that their meaning was something simple like beauty or amiable.
Stephanotis, she reads again, heart fluttering against the base of her throat. Marital bliss.
She hardly realizes she is standing until she is, her hand gripping the back of her chair until her knuckles turn white. He couldn’t – he couldn’t have known, not –
Not that. He wouldn’t have –
Her knees smack into the mattress, and she realizes she has stumbled to her bed. She can’t have been so wrong. He would have told her – would have said something. He could not have been silent so long, not if what he wanted was –
Was everything. Was forever.
Shirayuki lays down, arm thrown over her eyes, and breathes.
But if he had, if he had meant it –
She loves him. She loves him, but –
Sleep claims her before she can reach a conclusion.
*
Shirayuki wakes to the darkened sky, dusky orange giving way to the deep blue of midnight, and the knowledge that she is not alone.
She doesn’t know how exactly; the soles of his boots are soundless against the floor, and he is so still she wonders if he is even breathing. Even so, she is unsurprised to see him lingering at the door to the balcony, his shoulders set with both hesitance and determination.
“Obi?” she slurs, sitting up. She shivers; she’d fallen asleep on the top of the covers, and some of the season’s chill has settled into her bones.
“Miss.” He comes to her as she swings her legs over the edge of the bed, dangling toward the floor. His hands slide into his pockets, his body a careful study in casual, but she knows him too well to miss the tension in his limbs, the wariness in his posture.
She ducks her head, trying to steel herself. “We should talk, shouldn’t we?”
His mouth curls wryly up at the corner. “I suppose if you’ve run out of places you can ride off to, Miss.”
She flushes painfully at that. “I just…” Her gaze flutters up to his, and all she can think of is how she wants to pull him to her, how she wants to touch him, to hold him.
“I don’t know how you’ve done it for so long,” she says finally, her eyes fixed on his.
His eyebrows furrow. “Done what, Miss?”
“How you never told me you loved me.” He tenses, as if she slapped him, but doesn’t look away. “It’s been so hard not to tell you.”
He is still, so still, and she thinks she must have made a mistake until his eyes soften, his mouth curving into a relieved smile. “Miss…”
“I love you,” Just saying the words is both terrifying and relieving, as if she is releasing a burden she had not realized she was carrying.
She watches the way the planes of his face ease, the way a smile blossoms on his lips, and – no, it is not her releasing weight, but a sharing of it between them.
“I couldn’t face you,” she admits, “not when I – when it would have been so easy to tell you.”
He lets out a chuckle, coming to sit beside her on the bed. “Why didn’t you just say so?”
“I…” Her gaze finally drops to where her hands fist in her lap. “I thought you didn’t want me.”
His laugh is dry, self-deprecating. “Oh, Miss.” His voice dips impossibly low, a distant rumble in his chest. “I want everything about you.”
Her breath catches in her throat, and she feels the same molten heat she did in the library unfurl in her core. The moment is taut between them, and she wonders if he’ll look at her, if he’ll tilt his head and press his lips to hers –
He lets out another laugh, disbelieving. “What made you think I didn’t?”
“Yuzuri,” she blurts out before she can stop herself. His eyebrows shoot to his hairline. “She said that you…that you and Tomomi would make a good couple. That you were well-matched.”
He bares his teeth with a certain dark humor. “Did she.” It’s not a question.
“Makiri wanted you to stay. He could pay you well. More than me, at least.” She bites her lip, suddenly shy. “And there was the possibility of a wife. Of a family, if that was what you wanted.”
“So you thought I would stay on at Lyrias?” That he would leave her.
“The offer seemed…” She ducks her head. “Attractive.”
His fingers curl under her chin, gently tilting her up to meet his gaze.
“Shirayuki.” His mouth splits into a wide smile as it wraps around the sound. Her heart stutters in her chest. “Weren’t you listening? Whatever direction you’re heading, I’ll be sure to follow along by your side.”
She remembers the heavy wetness of her leggings, the snow tipped into her boots, the way the wind had whipped her cheeks raw and the warmth that had radiated in her breast, the way that moment had felt like more. “Oh.”
Even then. Even then it had been this way. Her heart feels too large for her body, like it might break free at any moment.
He leans forward, so slow, so tentative, and she knows she could pull back; that even now, after all this, she could still walk away and keep what they have. It is not too late to close this door, and he is letting her.
She is relieved to find that finally she does not want to.
Shirayuki leans up into his kiss, her heart fluttering at the soft brush of his fingers against her cheek, the gentle way they wind in her hair. Her fingers grip at his coat, smoothing over the stiff fabric at his shoulders. It is so different from before, where desire had made them ravening mouths and greedy hands.
It’s time, she realizes, that makes the difference. They have all the time in the world.
That doesn’t stop her from winding her fingers into the laces of his scarf, pulling intently when his mouth finally opens against hers. He pulls back, the parting of their lips making a soft smack in the silence of her room. She leans in again, chasing his mouth. Obi laughs, closing his hand around hers.
“I’m not sure you want to do that, Miss,” he warns, a little breathless. His hands are warm on hers, rough.
She wrinkles her nose. “Don’t go back to that. I like the way you say my name.”
“Is that so?” His eyes are so dark, the hoarseness in his voice make her think it isn’t just the dimness of her room.
His fingers thread through her own, and he pulls at the cord between them. The scarf falls away, and she –
“Oh,” she murmurs, taking in the fading marks all along the column of his neck. “I, um, have a salve for that…”
“I think it’s too late for that.” He dips he head closer to her, meeting her gaze with a sly grin. “Besides, I like that you’ve left your mark on me, Shirayuki.”
Oh.
She yanks him towards her by the collar, running her hands close along his scalp, licking along his teeth. His moan is muffled, surprised. She doesn’t know how he expects her to control herself when he talks to her like that.
They overbalance, her spilling back against the pillows, him hovering just over her. Their mouths jostle apart at the impact, Obi letting out an almost pained whine before he collect himself. This close she can see the flush on his cheeks as he tries to pull back, tries to put space between them, but she holds him close, her arms locking around him and pulling him down to her parted lips.
He relaxes into her, pliant beneath her hands. Where he is yielding, she is wild; her nails scrape down his scalp and urge him closer, tempt him to follow her descent into abandon. For a moment he does, groaning into her mouth, slotting one of his legs between hers and licking into her mouth with the same heat she feels flickering up her spine –
His hands slide along the duvet until he rests on his elbows, one of his hands cupping the nape of her neck. Their pace slows under his direction, going from her more frantic movements to long, languid, lingering kisses. He touches her as if they have all the time in the world, as if there is nothing else for him to do but this.
She likes this, she does, but – but the way his mouth purred her name is still fresh in her mind, and there’s more to this, she knows. Her tongue traces just so over his bottom lip and he gasps, pulling back with a pant.
“Shirayuki, wait,” he says, and it’s better when her name slips off his tongue so easily, as if he has been using it in his mind for longer. One hand wraps around the wrist she has by his head, and he strokes softly along her pulse-point, sending shivers down her spine. “I just – I just wanted to –”
“Mm?” she hums, arching a little into him. The look he gives her is almost panicked.
“I wanted to say,” he starts, calmer now, “I would like to court you, if you would let me.”
She stares. “You want an official courtship?”
His skin darkens in a blush. “Yes. I could even write you a formal request, if that’s what you’d like.”
She takes in his face, so hopeful, so bright. “No.”
It’s as if she’s snuffed a candle, the way the light leaves his face. His shoulders tense beneath her hands. “Oh.”
“Obi,” she sighs. “Haven’t you courted me enough?”
His brow furrows, but he follows her gaze to where the orchid rests. “Oh. You mean…” He can’t even bring himself to say the words. He swallows hard against her wrist. “You want…”
“Yes.” She can hardly keep from smiling. “If that was what you meant, back on the balcony. If that was what you were – what you were hoping for.”
“Yes,” he says, though it’s hardly more than a whisper. “Yes, more than – more than I had –” He shakes his head, lowering his lips to hers and –
This is more like it. His mouth slants against hers, tongue curling along the roof of her mouth, sliding against hers, one of his hands hooking around her waist as he slides between her legs –
There is a growl, and it does not come from either of their throats. Now it is Shirayuki who blushes.
He stares at her, grinning. “When was the last time you ate?”
“Not since this morning,” she admits, reluctant. He laughs, dropping his head to her shoulder.
“Come then, love,” he says, and she likes that even better. “Dinner first, celebrating later.”
*
Wistal has no true winter; with a shawl wrapped around her shoulders and an extra petticoat, Shirayuki hardly feels the slight chill in the air. With the queen consort on one side and the princess on the other, she is warmer still. Akaibara, used to no winter at all, whines when a breeze passes over them.
“I should have insisted we stay another week,” she whines, rubbing at her reddened nose.
Haki scoffs. “It’s only going to get colder. Winter has hardly even begun.”
“It won’t be that much colder,” Shirayuki says soothingly, shooting the consort a warning look. “Hardly enough for the ponds to freeze at its worst.”
Akaibara stares. “Ponds…freezing?”
She sniffles, standing up. Shirayuki glances up, shivering at the lack of warmth on that side. “Where are you going?”
“I’m going to tell Zen we’re wintering in Viande.” She stomps a few steps before stopping, looking thoughtful. “Forever.”
Zen smiles when he sees his wife. He pulls away from where he had been tugging at Obi, demanding to be given his nephew, and turns to greet her. His mouth bows downward the more words she speaks, and Akaibara’s gestures turn aggressive; the large sweeps of her arms and and quick chops of her hand paired with Zen’s stern countenance and quick, agitated shakes of his head mark the beginning of one of their stormy disagreements.
It would concern her, if she did not think they secretly liked their quarrels. She imagines there is a novelty to it; it is not as if a second prince or a second princess has many they may consider their peer, and neither of them would think to raise their voice to someone who could not do the same. Even from here, she can see their eyes spark, the small upturn at the corners of their mouths.
“Good luck to her,” Haki laughs. Tucked deep into her shawl, Kenta grunts at the noise. “These Wisteria men love their country.”
Shirayuki hums in agreement, leaning over to glimpse the baby’s face. Kenta doesn’t look like anyone in particular yet, not even his twin, though Haruto suggested he favored his uncle more than his father, much to the annoyance of both parties. He watches her with wide, wary blue eyes, grabbing at the finger she uses to tickle his belly and letting out a squawk of protest.
She hears yelling from across the lawn and peers up. Akaibara is shouting at Zen, who is in turn shouting at Obi. Obi, for his part, sidesteps Zen’s hands, holding the elder prince close to his chest. Isamu seems contented in his arms, burrowed deep in the blanket Obi has tossed over his shoulders.
“I’m glad this all worked out.”
Shirayuki glances up at the consort, confused. Haki smiles softly at her son. “This. You and Obi.” She huffs out a breath, blush rising prettily on her cheeks. “I glad you’re happy.”
“I’ve always been happy,” Shirayuki says, confused. She had felt sadness, to be sure, and hurt, but she had been all right. The sadness in her has always been momentary.
“No, not like this.” Haki shakes her head. “When you came to me you were settling. You thought this was all you could have, and were determined to be contented with it. But now…” He gaze settles on Obi, cooing down into the shawl wrapped around him. “Now you are happy, in the way that you are moving forward, towards more. You are expectant for more happiness.”
Shirayuki follows her stare, watching the way Obi cradles the prince against his chest, wondering how that might look with a child with a head of dark, thick hair, and skin a more golden hue. Her chest tightens pleasantly, expectantly.
“Yes,” she says, watching as the King of Clarines approaches, holding his hands out for his son. Here is a request Obi cannot deny. “But so are you.”
Haki smiles. “Yes. We all have been fortunate these past few months.”
Obi, child removed from his care, saunters toward them. The consort’s smile widens at his approach. “Was your charge stolen from you, Sir Knight?”
“Yes, by a dastardly king, I’m sad to say,” he replies, his lips parted in a grin. “And it has made me turn to banditry myself.”
“Is that so?” Haki drawls, adjusting Kenta on her lap as he squirms. “You mean to steal away your betrothed I take it?”
He shrugs, fixing her with a hopeful stare. “If she’ll have me.”
Shirayuki takes the arm he offers, tucking her hand in the crook of his elbow. “Always.”
He seems relieved, as if he had thought she might still yet tell him no, even after these two blissful weeks. He leads her away from the crowd, through the herb gardens.
“You aren’t just trying to get me alone to kiss me, are you?” she asks, though secretly she hopes he is. She has grown accustomed to being kissed often and well.
His smile turns sly. “Miss, would I ever?”
“Yes,” she tells him, pulling her to face her. “Often. And gladly.”
“Ah, well, with such an invitation…” Her leans down, brushing his lips against hers.
“Haven’t I said not to call me that,” she murmurs against his lips. “We’re going to be married, Obi. You can’t call me ‘Miss’ forever.”
“If you want me to call you by your name, Shirayuki –” she shivers, mouth curling in contentment – “then you need to stop looking at me like that when I say it.”
She flushes, quickly looking away. “And another thing.” She clears her throat, searching for the high ground. “Despite my confessing my love to you, you have not said that you love –”
“I love you,” he says, devastatingly earnest, before capturing her lips again. “I always have.”
“O-oh.” She licks her lips, stilling the trembling in her hands by fisting his coat in them. “Oh my.”
He searches her face, concerned. “Is that not what you wanted?”
“N-no, I –” She tries to quell the fluttering of her heart. “I just didn’t think you’d say it so easily.”
His face is serious for a long moment before smoothing into happiness. “It’s been harder not to tell you.” He rests his forehead against hers, letting their breath mingle between them. “And I’d be happy to tell you every day for the rest of our lives. More than once if you like.”
She shakes her head, grinning. “Only as often as you think it.”
“Shirayuki,” he chides, his voice slipping into a teasing drawl. “How will I get anything done if I am telling you every moment?”
Her breath stills in her chest. She loves him. She loves him so much. “I don’t know,” she breathes, carding her hand through his hair. “But I suppose we’ll find out.”