Chapter Text
The hands that should have been intertwined kept breaking apart.
As if, from the very beginning, you couldn’t be loved.
Saber is rather handsome—Kurt could not help the idle thought skipping across his consciousness, hopscotching and hopeless, on warmest days when the war is, for once, softened by the summer swell, each pair of Master and Servant seeming to save their battles for cooler climates, as the heat drips in wet afternoon bouts of rain, the semisweet odor of cloying molasses and barley, withering corn husks and ripened garden vegetables, wafting in the stifling atmosphere.
As half-grown as a vine of emerald and ruby tomatoes, blotting at the tender undersides of his arms with tissues to wipe the dots of sweat, he watches—golden threads of hair pinned tidily back, the soft line of firm jaw, the parting of white cotton as one button is unfastened at the throat: he can't glimpse an adam apple, there. Kurt is swarmed in perfumed thoughts of how firm Saber's fingers might feel, when helping in the domestic chores of carrying laundry baskets or grocery shopping, if their hands were to brush.
And upon offering two popsicles, one for each of them, to suckle at, if a thumb happens to incidentally brush an index finger upon handing over the treat, his shiver is entirely from the iced drip of artificial watermelon and candy seeds down the cuff of one sleeve.
“So,” He enquires, girlish and gay, between a mouthful of sugared fruit slush: “What did you want to tell me?” He swallows.
The title of king carries with it an implication, one he had so wishingly and foolishly believed. “—Arthur? King Arthur? But—you're not—” Kurt is but a beginner, mana-dysfunctional with a pin-prickled, pacifist heart; whereas Saber is royalty, ermine-furred and crowned and deserving of a master of prestige. For them to meet each other, circumstances as they are, could have been nothing short of an extraordinary turn of fate.
“You're not a boy?” With wobbling words and a phlegm-dripping nose and damp lashes, it comes out as heart-fractured. “———Oh. Well, um.” He wipes his spilling gaze on his sleeve. and all the previous details from before, confront him: the slight swell of her chest, narrow shoulders, the battle gown. The bunches of wildflowers and patches of thorned berries and pollen just beyond the porch, lit with the bulbs of fireflies, give an excuse for his tears. “Then you won't want to share a room with me, anymore.”
Her new Master is an interesting one; he's young, younger than her (although you would not know it by looking; she is eternally youthful, trapped like a fly in amber), soft around the edges and classically handsome (she notices in a detached way) that reminds her of one of the knights who used to ride out with her. Different, though. Not concerned with feats of arms or ruling or mastering the world. No, he has different goals and his feet take him down a different path.
She doesn't mind that at all. In fact, she secretly enjoys it, hiding her own thoughts and emotions behind the stoic mask she tends to arrange her face into. It isn't always easy—she is a Servant, yes, but the heat still affects her and the slow, long summer days seem to melt into one another, with little sign of action and instead she has been content to help him simply live, half-hoping that the domestic idyll can last a little longer.
There is shopping and laundry and occasional gardening (although she has never claimed to have a green thumb) and a dozen other things to keep her Master's house in order. She is a King, true, but she began life ignorant of the fact and it brings to mind her happier days in her youth, when all she had to worry about was her "family" and little else.
But he deserves to know.
So she accepts the popsicle, feels the brush of his finger and attributes it to nothing more than chance. His shiver to nothing more than the ice-cold. She does have a love for the food of this era and popsicles are almost a miracle to her—cool and sweet and frozen.
“Yes.”
This conversation feels like it should be more formal than it is. Despite the heat, she wears a shirt, buttoned to the collar and wrist, neat slacks. It keeps her focused. Presentable. Easier than wearing her armor at all times.
“You may have guessed already, but I feel as if I should tell you—my true identity.” A pause and she licks the popsicle, feeling a bit silly. “I am Arturia Pendragon; King Arthur, of legend.”
His reaction makes her less sure and her hand lowers, popsicle forgotten for the moment so she can focus on him. There is a flicker of confusion in her eyes. She is not used to affection, to love, to romance, and so it takes her long moments to figure out what's gone wrong and why his eyes start to well with tears and why his voice seems to crack slightly. He is not an experienced mage or one with a killer instinct, but she thinks she cares for him all the more for that.
Why does he start to cry?
You're not a boy.
Things start to fall into place or she thinks they do. Her popsicle melts, spattering stickiness against the porch.
“Why not?” She sounds surprised, slightly confused.
“Master, that doesn't matter to me.” Perhaps he thinks it inappropriate for them to share a room, now that he understands her sex.
“I don't believe you would do anything inappropriate.” Or maybe—but Saber has never been good with love or romance. She misunderstands completely. “Besides, it's for your protection.”
As if pastel cherry blossoms, battered from the branch, he trembles dumbly, sniffling as he tries to articulate a reason, mopping up the thick pearls of fast-falling tears with the palm of his hand, the hem of his cardigan: sailor-esque attire of powder blue and pales, the translucent wrapper of his popsicle rattling as he crumples it up, half a triangle wedge bitten off entirely, falling to join its splattered sibling in a melting puddle of red dye.
Above, hordes of opaque clouds drift, as if ships in seas, darkening the boiling sun as they cross, as if viewed through sheets pinned to a clothesline. It gives him a few moments to gather himself, refraining from all but bursting into sobs, gulping gasps and choked breaths and candy-scented cries. Breathing thinly through twin nostrils, his chin cants upwards, diamond-sparkling gaze puffed powder-pink from weeping, chocolate lashes clumped and matted, studying, truly, for the first time: just how lovely she is, in her androgyny, the mingling of the masculine. how he still admires the rose-pale curl of her ear, unadorned by jewelry, or the sharp cut of boyish slacks on her figure, or the gloss-less matte of her mouth.
His own mouth trembles, parting and wet and salt-flavored, the cupid bow of his upper lip strung taut, the bottom one puckering slightly, before—he presses a hand against it, muffling his words, bony knuckles against hard teeth.
“You're very special to me, Saber. How—other boys—just boys—are special to me.”
Not quite a confession; rather, an explanation. As she had been honest with him, even as it swiftly scissors his heart in two. As much as, one day, he aims to be an adult capable of protecting himself, to stand upon his own buckling knees, he is simply just an adolescent, and the protection she affords him is a warm comfort, a guilt-ribboned pleasure, as if he is cherished and treasured. Following behind her, until autumn comes, and winter glooms, and spring blooms. “I wouldn't, I won't, I—” He nods in assurance, fumbling and stumbling.
“I—I wish—my wish for the grail is love.” Pure and true love, granted by magic or mythos: gestures of chaste affections, from infatuation sprouting the first growth of a spring adoration, romance flourishing with golden rings and wedding bells. Not to ever push his feelings onto another, but if the grail can give just one gift, as childish as it is, he has chosen. Kurt watches Saber, if she would decipher his definition.
Saber can feel her heart wrenching in her chest and she tries to clamp down on it; to maintain that stoic demeanor she's built for herself and maintained through her time as king, through her time here, but Kurt—Kurt is different and although he's her Master, he's also a friend by this point, as young as he is and as strange as he sometimes seems to her. She likes him, wants him to be happy, beyond that banal role of Master and Servant. So seeing him close to simply and openly weeping disturbs her and she tosses her popsicle aside and scoots down the porch step until she's still alongside him, gaze fixated out over the yard.
Distant, but close, because she has never been good at this sort of thing. However much she'd like to be. To comfort has not been in her nature. It's awkward, different, something apart from the icy coolness of being the unfeeling king. Her hands seem to want to do something, raising half an inch before they settle on her knees again, back straight, strands of that golden hair falling across her face from where they've come loose from her ponytail.
His words finally make her understand.
Maybe it really is her lot in life to be doomed by love.
“I...think I understand.”
She says the words slowly, forming them, as if trying them out before reluctantly setting them free into the world. He is a lover of men. Of boys. And for a time he thought she was one, which - well. It's not entirely inaccurate. She was a king. But now he knows and perhaps his love cannot be anymore; maybe it changes.
Her heart twists again. Doesn't she care about him? Is that love? She always pushed the thought of it away. Her gaze slides to him, watching him out of the corner of her eye as she tries to formulate a response that won't feel stilted and awkward. Kurt isn't androgynous; perhaps more feminine, but undeniably male in his form and the school uniform reinforces that, even if he looks younger than he really is. Boyish. Charming.
Well, would be, if he weren't close to completely weeping.
“That... is a good wish, I think.” Her voice is soft, grasping onto something she feels she can actually discuss.
“Although I don't know if the Grail can control others' hearts.”
Another pause, a realization that that may not be what he wants to hear. She draws a breath, the coolness in her eyes warming as she glances sidelong at him, still unsure of how to approach this. It is not in her nature.
“Romance was beyond me, I admit, as king. I thought I did not have time for it; that I could not...express it and still love my people.” Her fingers curl against the cloth of her slacks, old memories dredged up. Bad memories.
“...I have never known love like that. Not in the way I think you mean.”
Which is an indirect, almost awkward way of saying she, perhaps, wouldn't mind finding it. But that isn't what she's here for, is it? It's to fight, to die, to win the Grail for him. But isn't that love, in a way? Especially with him, young and full of potential and hope and a wish for something so utterly romantic and heroic. She envies him that youthful, wide-eyed belief.
“I am sorry that I'm not who you believed me to be.” That, said softer, apologetic. Not wretched, but sincere. “That I cannot be that person for you.”
She was. Just minutes before, she had been the very seed of an apple only he beheld, the armor of his cushion-plump heart, Midas hues of finery, bronze, and butter, sun-petals and june mornings, the one to rouse him in the dawn, to greet him home in the afternoon, to bid him a good slumber in the evening. And, in his secret imaginings, even more than dear friend and domestic companion: Saber as the brisk husband, and Kurt, flour-powdered and apron-tied as he cares for the home. But never an expectation, nor a reality. She is sapphire-blooded and courageous and carries her crumbling kingdom with her still, upon a crown of thistles and thorns. In her reign, he would have scraped and bowed before her as a peasant, and in his era, she is still a glorious after-image of her tale, compared to his common lineage.
He loved—loves—loved her.
“Don't be.” He mumbles, beginning to settle, sniffing hard and a stain of pink across his mouth, the flavor of wood and sugar, distilled childhood. A glimpse of a pink petal, blotting away the residue with his tongue, his faltering fingers. From her hands, taut against the material of her trousers, the shared subject is a sharp twig, to prod and pester at their individual bruises. He begins to protest, that his wish is not to infringe against the wills of others, but she must be correct, that there could be no other method: no male has loved him, wholly, and no one will. Unless the Grail conceives of a new man, borne from earth.
“Romance can be expressed in—other ways, I find: a love letter in a notebook,” How he has written names in curling petite lettering, jejune oaths and miniature artworks of hearts and arrows. “Or serenading someone,” Ballads still written upon his tongue. “Or telling them, even when they say no, after.” But he has never had a lover, never been taken to bed, nor loved so thoroughly in methods rather not thought of, so it is all just his fanciful, fruitless, futile thoughts. Whether in exhaustion or surrender, Kurt leans inwards, as if birch bones and paper limbs folding, drawing paired knees to his chest, a frown curling his lips downwards.
His smallest finger, laid across the wood floorboards, is centimeters from hers. How he blushes at the hint of contact, how his jumbled feelings cannot simply end, how-ever they may be: platonic, romantic, intimatish. to linger on a matter other than his own shattered-ornament heart, a valentine-bright bauble gathering dust, he says:
“I’ll die without you.”
Uttered with absolute finality; he cannot bear to raise a hand against even his enemies. Moreover, his dribbling mana cannot infinitely supply her. How does he replenish it?
A treasure trove of iced sticky sweets in plastic molds shimmers in a nearby bucket of ice. He takes a lemonade-yellow one, citrus-sharp and fragrant, and extends it to her, trembling fingers held around its stick. “I'll share it with you. I'll share all my mana with you, too.”
Lineage means very little to her anymore; what matters is to be a good ruler rather than a foolish one. Blood brings with it burdens and responsibilities, but she is not sure she believes any longer in the idea that blood can give one that inherent capability to rule. The right. Her bloodline was strong; she was the heir to Uther, to all of England, and yet she failed in the end. Her kingdom cast down in wreckage and ruin, her knights (her friends) dead and dying around her and her own child mortally wounding her in their last confrontation.
No; she would be king again, if she could be, if only to fix what she has broken.
That is no longer her path, though. Her path is to seek the Grail; to fight for another and to die if necessary. Over and over again.
“Even those ways—” There is an ache in her words, in her bones, even though she sits as straight and rigid as ever, still strong, still bearing the weight of the world (of her failures) and refusing to flinch.
“—I was not good at them. I did not use them. And that is partially why my kingdom crumbled apart.”
She sounds matter-of-fact about it, even though she hates the memory, regrets the hurt she inflicted on her wife. She cannot change that, though. Unless the Grail grants her redemption and another chance, but that is a dream.
The scrape of wood, the closeness of his hand, is noticeable and she debates with herself for a long moment, unsure if she should push him away; discourage him now that his heart has already been broken, or if he would prefer something from her. There is so much that she cannot give him, but she is still his Servant and he is still her Master. As weak a mage as he is, she will not turn away from him. It is not in her nature.
So she watches him for a moment, watches the way he folds in on himself, hurting and wretched, and her finger moves a fraction of an inch, allowing their hands to rest side by side, the barest touch of skin. A warmth, the beating pulse of mana that keeps her alive, fuels her. She takes from the world and from him, even though what he gives is the barest trickle of it. He says he will die, though, and that makes her glance at him (fully, for the first time since this awkward conversation began), eyes wide in alarm.
“Kurt—”
She's starting to object. He cannot die. She has pledged herself to him. She won't let that happen. Better for her to perish.
“Kurt, I won't allow that. I won't let you—” For the first time, her voice seems to waver, to choke slightly with emotion. He is offering to... what? Give her every scrap of his life-force, as much as he can tear out of himself and pour into her? For what? For himself? For her?
“I can't let you destroy yourself for my sake.” She continues, slow and sad, and worried. She reaches out her other hand—the other remains, fingers brushing his in a touch that feels too intimate and yet too casual—and takes the sweet from him. Their fingers touch and she pauses like that, frozen in the moment, the two of them sharing that hold.
“I can't let you die. I won't.” His offer lingers though. It hangs in the air and she wonders—if she had more mana, would she stand a better chance of winning? Her voice has gone soft again.
“You deserve to live.”
He could order her, of course. He still has the command seals. She doesn't want to think about that, though.
He had merely spoken the truth; such ancient mages would dispose of him, as if a soft-bristled scrubbing rag, if they were apart. He shudders at the Matou family: their disgusting crest worms, the undulating soft-silk worms, dark jeweled shells of infinite insects, writhing into his every orifice—the Tohsaka family, with their advanced craft—the Einzbern family, with their albinic daughter and snowy fortress.
He is struck, as if heat-stunned, at her kindnesses, such mercies, the tenderness she gives him, wincing at not just the beautific ribbons of an afternoon sun, beating down upon them, but the notion that one of them will suffer an early death, one before the other. And of morbidity and gothic secrets, he vows to never divulge to her his previous thoughts of suicide, and that he would rather be a sacrifice for her noble throne, than to subsist from a hollow victory. “Then you can't, either.”
The outline of her finger presses against his, by simple millimeters, all soft joints and groomed nails, apricot-fine hairs brushing together, her heartbeat measured in contrast to the fluttering of his own. He is so startled by her other hand 'round his, that he nearly drops the suckle-sweet, the frozen rind and seeds and pulp of crystallized lemon caught in its own juice, sour and bittersweet, dripping a honey-pale column down his wrist. “Oh!” A silly cry of half-hearted alarm, nose crinkling, cheeks patching strawberry-red, as he laps a wet stripe of spittle down the flimsy stick and his own wrist. He would be fortunate not to catch splinters, mouth puckering at the tart acidity. “Mm.” He mumbles, swallowing heavily, coughing for a moment, lowering his face to not be impolite.
In the abrupt jostling, his fingers have accidentally crossed hers, half-laced, as if in the eyelets of shoes, lace untied partway. He nudges the popsicle towards her, only to relinquish the other half, but finds their opposite set of fingers are both stained and sticky-bound. They'll have to wash them, holding hands down the hallway, perhaps, until they rinse in the sink.
“W-we should cook supper.” He suggests, but he does not rise, nor tie the apron over his fragile figure, nor chop the garden vegetables and precious herbs for micro-salads. The flimsy pretense for their ordinary schedule to presume falters, his breath catching in audible trembles, apple-core-savory and tangerine-sweet. She carries with her hints of masculinity, still, as if that bit of specific flesh between two thighs would dismiss all of his woes—and he immediately snaps to reality at such an ugly, terrible thought: Saber is fine as she is, and he can't dream, couldn't deign to hope, for any physicality beyond such pitying gestures, regardless of her sex. But the matter is, he aches for other boys, not girls.
“I cannot promise that; my life—” If this strange existence can really be called a ‘life’. “—is in service to yours. And I will not falter in that mission.”
Unless he commands her. Unless he uses a seal. But she would hate that, would detest the choice ripped from her. Her duty would not be discharged and he would be dead and where would that leave her? A Servant without a Master. Nothing to do but seek out a new one or wait for the lack of mana to cause her to fade. No; she shakes her head.
“You have a life to live. Mine has already come and gone.”
Which is true, but there are always loopholes. Her train of thought is derailed by the intermingling of their sticky fingers and the way he leans down to lick the juice from his own skin. She watches him with a quiet sort of contemplation. She has an affection for him and she does not dare put a name like love to it. In a way, his innocence reminds her of Irisviel and she has bitter memories of that relationship being torn from her by fate and by the last Grail War she fought in. He's different, though. Younger, with more of a life in front him. More innocent, in some ways, since Irisviel had spent her life knowing what she was made to do.
“We should.”
She agrees, voice soft, not sure of where to go from here after that out-pouring of emotion. He still seems a little lost, a little forlorn, and she doesn't know how to fix that. She is not really his king, however much he might like her to be. So she slowly climbs to her feet, pulling him with her, despite the sticky, cool juice. It's a little unpleasant, but...his touch isn't.
She shouldn't think about things like that.
She squeezes his hand, thumb pressing into his skin and muscle and bone, urging him to stand. Feeling how soft he is.
“We should wash up first. Unless you would rather wait.”
She gives him that choice, not wanting to push too hard. She can't be what he wants. But she can still be something that he needs. But for now, she stands there, the sharp smell of citrus in the air between them, eyes locked on his, waiting.
“We can stay out here a little while longer, if you prefer.” The offer is not meant unkindly, but perhaps it is cruel all the same. The dangling of something that is not what he wants (but so very close) and offering something she cannot really give.
“And when I run out of mana?” His tone is brittle, refusing to stand, sitting up on his knees, allowing his shoulder to be tugged with an undertone of impatience, his tender tongue abruptly lime-stinging. “I don't have much as it is, after…” He allows the words to drop, as if twigs in a pyre, the memory of their first battle still between them. The raw flesh of his three taboo command seals, branded into the bone of his pelvis, still tingles with the small sparks of magic.
“How could I get more? How could I have another Servant, after you?” Pepper and spice, offended by the notion that he could so simply find another, cherry-blushed from the stagnant heat and fine brows furrowing, sighing thinly.
But he does come to stand, his palm to hers, thumb to index to ring fingers together, warm and summer-short, precious and scarlet-threaded, bound together until she tires of him. his gaze practically heart-imprinted, clutching a little firmer.
“I'm happy like this.” An embellishment, as the day melts before them, pests beginning to emerge from emerald lettuce heads and ripe orbs of yellow-striped tomatoes; it is just a few degrees too hot. “But if you're hungry, how about minestrone soup? From our very own garden.”
His appetite has withered, barely bothered by the grumble of his stomach. But he realizes how much she eagerly awaits supper, complimenting his home cooking.
“And hamburger.” Simple fare, with none of his ambitious flourishes, such as warm cocoa-stuffed loaves of pain au chocolat, or whole fowls in coq au vin. Today it is plain American, and he cannot even summon the adventurous spice bottles, mere ketchup and mustard as accompaniment.
In the small kitchen, all antique tile and wooden cabinets, the little sculpted squares of meat simmer in identical puddles of virgin oil, the iron pan spitting. He wipes his hands against the apron-front, peeling the paper backings from slices of cheese. Kurt turns, to replace a carton of eggs in the refrigerator—and comes close to clashing into Saber, eggs dropping, yolks spilling, a fragile mosaic of shells beneath his socks, kneeling low to gather the runny mess with a napkin. His fingers are still scented from their half-eaten popsicles, and he presses them to his tangerine-tinted lips:
An imitation of a kiss.
She doesn't have an answer for him. Without her, he's unlikely to succeed in this war. Once she's gone, he's out of the running. And if he's lucky, no one will think it worth the effort to kill him. A weak mage without a Servant isn't competition, after all. She can't be sure, though. She can't be sure of anything, if she's killed here. So she just squeezes his hand, trying to be reassuring, half wishing she was still a king and that she could reassure him in a better way than this.
“You might not need one. And you might not lose me. Don't think on it like that—”
But that isn't reassuring, she knows. And so she goes quiet and follows him inside, where they work on dinner together. She's still learning how to cook. As much as she loves food, she wasn't a fantastic cook when she was alive and is still learning now. She rolls her sleeves up, ties on an apron of her own, and goes to work, cutting vegetables and hauling ingredients, moving around him in the kitchen in that sort of intricate dance that one does when you're working in a close space with someone else.
There's something else to it now, of course. She's aware of his feelings and he's aware of what she is, who she is, and it colors everything. Maybe that's why they run into one another; they're distracted, thinking. She steps back hastily, feet bare against the cool tile, and then she bends down to help, in time to see him press his fingers to his lips. Her heart skips a beat, drops.
He has it bad, doesn't he?
She likes Kurt. He's gentle, soft in his own way, with his own reserves of strength. Fond. She doesn't know if it's love, but she's never been good at feeling love in the first place, in identifying it or figuring out what to do with it once she's realized it. How does she approach this? Her mind is still working over that problem as she helps to mop up the mess, brow furrowed.
She makes a decision.
Her hand reaches out, scrubbed clean with soap and water, rests fingers against his wrist in a gentle little touch.
“You don't have to hold it in for my sake.” She's giving him permission to feel. To express whatever it is that's tearing his heart up. Sorrow or confusion or disappointment; let it out. She'll take it, she'll weather it. She's a king—she can handle it. Even if she's not always sure how to respond.
“I-I'm fine. It's not the first time.” As if reciting from a trembling greeting card, paper corners crushed in an ill-fitting envelope, the rubber stamp faded and dried, and a placating half-smile curling at his lips, as if for a portrait, wax fruit and hollow books. Her hand curled around the drooping stem of his wrist, the dangling bouquet of limp fingers, presses cool imprints into his hot flesh, pale buttons of treasured touch against reddish velvet, platonic. —They're simply opposites, but would circumstances have been so altered if she were a man? A rejection would still be a rejection.
The meat begins to burn, pleasant umami replaced by bitter charcoal, and he fumbles with the stove knob, lowering the flame until it sputters, and extinguishes. “Lettuce, please.” He mumbles, but he goes to fetch it himself, crisp butter leaves breaking off one by one, a thin coring knife cutting out bits of decay, not pulling his other hand from hers. he lays a few emerald pages upon plump bakery buns, then cheddar cheese, and—
Tears drop into the frying pan, an accidental dose of salt seasoning their intended meal. The meat is inedible, now, along with the sweet caramel threads of onions and thick sauce. “Oh, no—!” He smudges a quilted oven mitten against his cheeks, the phlegm dripping from his nose, head-aching and tired and half-sobbing. “T-there should be leftovers, i-in—the lowest drawer.” Because food is the most important aspect of such a miserable evening, not his addled affections. Not how Kurt is faring, the exact part of his chestnut coiffure falling over his bare brow, the stained apron rumpled and socks damp, the silverware drawer open and nudging him close to Saber, how—how —
Chocolate kisses, tin-wrapped, sit upon the table: forbidden simplicities, dessert before dinner. He raises his chin, nose upwards, mouth parted as if flavoring the morsels, almost waiting—
She lets his wrist go for a moment as he deals with the stove, her gaze still following him, hands frozen, half raised, arms extended, as if she's not sure what to do with them. She isn't, honestly. Emotional comfort is strange and something she's not used to offering. She moves automatically, going to get the lettuce, and then he starts sobbing again and she can't really bring herself to care about dinner anymore. Not right now.
“Kurt. Master.”
The words are simple, clipped, and she steps forward, not sure how to do this, not sure what else she can do as they come closer to one another. Her arm goes out, filled with a strength that belies her frame, and wraps him into an embrace. They're both messes, still wearing aprons, him in socks, her in bare feet. She has to raise her head slightly to meet his gaze, has to lock eyes with him. There's a flutter of indecision. She can't be what he wants. She won't ever be. She wraps him in that hug, feeling unsure and stilted, like she's going through the motions without properly understanding them, and then, hesitating, presses a chaste kiss against his cheek.
She's trying to comfort. She doesn't know if she succeeds.
He refuses to leave the embrace, fingers hooking, clinging and almost cuddling, felt heart pinned to his heaving chest and hemmed sleeves, and although she had invited honesty from him, upon showing it, he is burdened all the more by bothering her with his spittle and snot and tears, hues of diamond and amethyst and rose quartz, inelegant and worthless trifles, virgin romance and impure urges. The kiss upon one cheek is the final blow, the surrender and submission, ceasing such child-blubbering to offer the same, lips shortly puckered at the bone of her cheek—giving in to the hug, the kiss: velour-wrapped presents in perfumed boxes, dark and pastels, contrast and conflict but he can't bring himself to exchange them, to rebuke, to ask instead for the manufactured niceties of an ordinary friendship in perfect ivory packages. He wishes for more than that, as odd and dubious these new gifts are.
“Saber. Arthur. —Arturia.” A stuffed murmur, holding close.
“Let's just go to bed, early.” The counter nudges against the dimples of his coccyx, a few inches and he could be sitting on it. But the celebration has faded, their exchanged pourboires beginning to tarnish, and he was fortunate to receive anything at all. Releasing her, he boxes up the wilted cabbage and lettuce, the shavings of pecorino and parmesan, the spoiled meat tied in a bag at the bottom of the garbage, scrubbing the counter, soaking the dishes. A premature night will bring a hurried morning, and afterwards, they can both carry onwards.
His bed is opposite of hers, twin bunks placed parallel, the sheets scented with sweet milk and creams, weathered romance novels and vintage film tapes categorized upon shelves, rose potpourri in glass pots in the washroom, the moon a dim crescent. Kurt tucks beneath the thick plumage of a comforter, a pillow held in his arms.
“Sweet dreams.” He bids her, but his lids cannot fall, not enchanted by slumber-dust, cried out into a dozen crinoline-crumpled tissues.
She holds him, for as long as it lasts, arms wrapped around him, letting him cry and sob and allowing the tension to bleed out of his body. Even a little bit. She isn't used to this, is still figuring out the fragile work of offering comfort, but she thinks this is what she needs to do. Has to do. She'll need to convince him to survive, when she's gone, and she needs to find a way to do it soon. They're in a war, as sedate as it's been so far, and to delay, to act as if they are merely on some sort of vacation will bring them up short.
If one of them lives, it will be him.
She murmurs his name in return, holds him until he says they should go to bed and then helps clean the kitchen without another murmur. It's quick and efficient, without complaint. She never does. Doing chores is not something a king would do, but she did not grow up as a king or prince. And she is not truly a king here. And maybe this will be the end of it. A warm embrace and murmured names and in the morning they will try to forget.
She doubts it, though.
She dresses for bed, wears pajamas to sleep in. She isn't sure how she feels about all of this, but she still curls under the covers, eyes bright as she watches Kurt from across the room. He's still troubled and she's not sure what she can actually do about that.
“If you can't sleep, we can talk.”
It's an offer. She doesn't strictly need to sleep, not quite like a human does.
“We could go grocery shopping, tomorrow.” Idle conversation, with ordinary topics, half-mumbling as he sits up halfway. “A chicken, salt, pepper, a pint of Love Potion Number Thirty-one—although it's not in season, but if we look in the dairy aisle…” He pauses, glancing across. “And popsicles.” For her. “And, oh, there's the toy store near, too…with these adorable stuffed animals. For—for children, but…” Button gazes and smiling snouts and paper tags with charming phrases, he would be glad to take one home, if replacing their broken air conditioning didn't come first. “And, a—a new movie, a romantic comedy, is playing…” Love is entwined with everything in his language, whether hinting or not.
Without the humming of a fan, the only sounds are their breath, the rumble of clouds. She deserves more than him: a Master with infinite mana and circuits, who could be victorious, because she only devotes herself to losing, if paired with him. It is only fair for her to refuse him, in love if not in battle. He shuts his eyes, and tries to dream.
—The classroom is emptied, students in identical crow-dark blazers leaving in flocks, the blackboard floured with chalk, thick erasers left in their slots. The caramel gleam of his shoes catching on the pair of the boy across from him, sharing a sole desk, but his schoomate's face is illuminated by sunlight. Kurt raises a hand to discern the other's identity, but to no avail. The male merely utters something about mathematics and geography homework, in a tone somewhat familiar, as if unisex. But the assignment isn't due, Kurt protests, jostling, the laces of one shoe becoming loosened, a tangle of string. He pushes his chair backwards, bending over low to tie it into a prim bow, and abruptly, the class companion is closing the space between them, a bit more matched in height, grabbing his quivering chin, leaning inwards—golden hair, pulled back—emerald gaze—
Saber.
—Kurt wakes, heaving, hot and damp, at one in the morning.
Saber listens in the dark, eyes watching as Kurt rattles on. It doesn't lull her, but it's almost comforting to hear him trying to plan out the next few days. So she waits as he runs himself down. There is love in every word and she tries to ignore it. He's said it himself; she's not a man. She cannot be what he wants.
Even if she were, she doesn't think it would be what he expects. So she finally sleeps as well, letting the sound lull her to sleep.
She wakes up when he does, brought awake by his alarm. She's out of bed almost instantly, taking in the room, senses extended for threats—and she finds nothing. She pauses, confused, and then slowly settles back onto her bed with a frown.
“...Kurt? Are you awake?”
She knows the answer.
“No.” His tone is pitched as if snapping violin strings, plucked to their limits, strung too tight.
“Just a bad dream.” He is not going to divulge the activities her imaginary male doppelgänger had been doing with him—on a desk! During school hours!—and mumbles: “I-I'm going to get ice.” It is too late for a cold shower, a chilled bath, and he is still blushed and weak-kneed and spiced-hot, for a reason other than the season.
Laundered socks catch against the raised floorboards and blunt heads of hammered nails, creaking as he stumbles in clumsy navigation, opening the refrigerator, bracing against the bare bulb, until he wraps his hand around a package of frozen vegetables: they had used the last of the ice when preserving the popsicles. He stares at the sack, wavering, the cheerful writing proclaiming its contents of sweet peas and corn kernels and carrot rounds.
The breath rattles in his narrow lungs, at the unwelcome nudge of sensitive flesh against the cotton lining of snug underwear. It would be exactly as if soothing a wound, ridding terrible symptoms. He wraps the pack in a paper napkin, sitting at a dining chair, knees parted, half-willing himself in pure exhaustion, to settle for a remedy as agonizing as—
The lights snap on, and he stiffens, waiting if it was just a loose switch, or—company, crying out:
“Making—breakfast!”
She lets him go at first, mind humming. There's a lot going on and she's struggling to find her footing and get back to a spot where they can be a unit again, instead of two individuals desperately trying to dance around the elephant in the room. It's not easy. It's difficult. Almost stupidly so. But she lets him go and settles on the bed for a few moments, taking deep breaths and considering as she listens to Kurt's footsteps fade down the hallway and then the distant sounds of him rummaging in the freezer.
After a minute or two, she decides to follow and it's her hand that flips the lightswitch in the dim kitchen. She's frozen for a moment, hearing his cry and then carefully turning her eyes away, pretending that she isn't seeing anything. She can't really ignore the lie, though. They have to discuss this, one way or another.
“Master... It's early.”
Too early, honestly.
The bag bursts upon the tile, iced fragments of stems and florets, a patchwork of primary hues and baby portions of chopped produce, but rather than fetch a broom to sweep the pieces up, he draws his posture upright, one knee crossing the other with deliberation, the dark silk of pajamas wrinkling at the tight joining of shin to shin, thigh to thigh, wound up as if a toy boy: painted pink cheeks and a wooden expression.
“As I said, I just had a dream.” His tone is measured: the example student, his thoughts on small subjects, such as the fading apple-hued brick, the grade of his latest exam, not anatomy lessons or physical education.
“—About you.” A confession with merely half of the truth, excluding the crucial details, reducing his story to an ordinary daily occurrence. “We were at school, studying together, helping with homework. My shoe was untied.”
“And you came over.” His breathing grows thin, shoulders wriggling, a hand held to his drumming heart, in the retelling. “I sat on the desk for you to lace it for me, and—” And, and, and: sugared, suckling kisses—pinned to the varnished surface of an individual table, papered with mock exams—clutching at buttons, blazers, and cardigans—but that would only entice further excitement, as opposed to dampening awful adolescent aches.
“A-and—and the bell rang.” He halts his thoughts there.
“And I woke up, and I'm hungry, so excuse me for cooking.” Back to faux-composure, apple-crisp and tart tones, curt sentences.
Saber is many things, but she is not really slow. She can pick up on these things, given enough time, given enough effort. Her eyes search his face, pick out the embarrassment, the obviousness of what he's saying and what he's doing. She tries to school her face into something placid. A mask for him that won't reflect her thoughts. He doesn't need that from her right now. Just...listening. An acknowledgement.
She doesn't know how to handle this. It's not being a king, it's not being a knight, it's not fighting. She never had a hand in raising her own son and this? This is like trying to deal with someone's first love and affection, but in the most terrible way. It's trying to mend someone's broken heart. Even though it was inadvertent, she's had a hand in it and she feels responsible.
She can guess how the dream ended, to get a reaction like this.
“Master.”
She finally says the word, enunciating it perfectly.
“Is there anything I can do to help you?”
Read between the lines. Please. She wants to do something—anything—to make this right again. She doesn't know if she can.
“You could start a shower, and bring the broom.” He pronounces, just as gingerly, for the innocent touch of her knee brushing against his own would truly murder him: a mere imitation of the opposite sex, a forbidden delusion, a wound neither of them could heal. “I-I'll change seats, so you could start...cleaning.” The word is laced with invitation: a glittering bell upon a string for a kitten. From her cue, he rises, sitting atop the kitchen counter, shins dangling several inches from the tile, the blunt heads of pale-plain socks clinging to the curl of his toes, one slipping down his sole.
—A cherry-wood desk, gleaming and pristine, shaken with every movement atop it—
He had refrained from dwelling upon the whole dream, frightening details: how Saber's fair marigold coloring had grown tarnished; cheeks jaundiced without a strawberry-cream bloom of youth; even the hues of irises, clover-bright to brass, matte without the shimmers of classroom bulbs; as if a corruption of the usual self—and the darker and deeper intimacies: the conjuration of a bizarre, alternate Saber refusing to halt at Kurt's protests, the sundering of stitches and seams, clothing coming apart with the ease of scissors cleaving papers, because if he wants to be with a boy so much, he will be treated as men do to each other—
Kurt somehow bent over the desk, school-books jutting into his stomach, the nightmarish version of Saber searching for a thin, longish object, as if a set of five fingers are insufficient for some terrible purpose: a fountain-bladed calligraphy pen, or the sharp graphite tip of a pencil, to try to—the warm puddle of spittle and the thick smearing of vanilla lotion—
What sort of person must Kurt be, to shudder from such a vile nightmare, but to wake sea-soaked with sweat, irritated from the lining of his garment. He would rather compress ice to his genitals than indulge himself, and he does not have any—protrusion, prawn-curled and pearl-pink. The lingering scent of brown-bottled vanilla, from week-old baked cookies, curdles his stomach, resisting the bodily impulse to be sick.
He glances across the kitchen to Saber: genuine and tangible and female. aesthetically pleasant, but not sexually seductive—not since that afternoon.
She can't peer into his mind, but she can guess. She has enough information to do that and yet she decides to leave it alone. Pressing for details won't help him. It certainly won't help her. So she simply nods and goes to start the shower and get the broom and dustpan. She returns, still in her night clothes, and begins to sweep, cleaning up the mess in silence.
This is all beyond her. It is outside her realm of knowledge. How does one solve problems of the heart? Especially when one does not return the feelings? Or cannot? Even if they desperately want to? It bothers her, tugs at her sense of propriety, but she doesn't mention it. She simply works around him, gaze distant.
Maybe that will be the best way to approach it. Pretend it doesn't exist.
The kitchen is small, of course, so by necessity they must be close. She does her best to not notice it—their proximity or his reaction to it. She won't let it bother her. Not visibly.
He hears the soft sloshing of water, a cure to his troubles, but he is not aroused anymore, merely melancholic, murmuring gratitudes and studying her as she tidies up the crumbs of spoiled food, so near that the hem of her cotton trousers rustles against his knee, and thin threads of her angel-pale hair, unbrushed and loose, break and catch in gossamer harp strings. after the trash bag has been knotted and the floor is bare once more, it is just them with idle time, Saber awaiting further chores, Kurt seated kiddishly. His battered heart is held in bondage in his chest, restrained and half-healed and injured from each refusal and rejection, sniffling and slumberless, and he begins to say: “Let's go to bed.”
In utter innocence, innocuous and ignorant, but a noted aspect about the Hummel household: the absence of a mechanical dishwasher, the cupboards stacked full with generation-stained glassware and antique fracturing portraits of ornamental scenery upon brittle plates and rusting silverware, the loose-hinged doors never quite shutting well. And when the unfastened knob presses a hard lump against the crown of his head, he jostles away from the intrusion, leaning forward—
Pure accident. the clacking of two sets of teeth: ivory and hard, milk-soft and miniature, the wince it induces, the muffled grunt—his lips sticky-damp with translucent balm, patterned with anxious nibbles, raw and swollen, plush and firm; hers are wafer-stiff, natural and bare, a bit boyish—
He hears his own little whimper, and it ends.
Kurt has ended up leaning against the cabinet, submitting and biscuit-limp, gasping for breath in great gulps, a thread of spittle glimmering from between their mouths: unfamiliar magic.
“It was an accident—” Barely audible, mush-mouthed syllables pinned together in a sentence. Years of oppression, unbuckled and bursting, to be fit back into its compartment: a Pandora box; a cursed treasure; a gleaming apple in the first garden to be feasted upon, if one only picks it from the branch.
“I'm hot—” He complains, “I-I-I'm sick.” The only explanation.
Let's go to bed.
After all of that. The cleaning, the shower, the bustle in the kitchen. Back to bed, back to sleep. She doesn't object, though. She doesn't have it in her. She is here to serve him and she is already walking on eggshells, being careful of his fragile heart, now that things have fallen apart so completely. She nods in response, is finishing with everything, preparing to turn back, when—
There's a jolt, lips pressed together. The slightly painful clack of teeth and her own eyes wide in surprise, hands grabbing at his shoulders to push (pull) and end this before it starts. She's left blinking and gaping like a fish when it's over, staring at him from an arm's length away. That hadn't been intended. None of this had been. She swallows, stares hard at him as he babbles.
“Kurt—”
She grips his shoulders, holds him there against the cabinets.
“You know I'm not—what you want.” Her voice is low, carrying in the dim, silent stillness.
“We can't—you can't keep doing this to yourself.”
She doesn't mean to accuse, but what else can she say?
Saber is absolutely correct, but try to tell that to his bewildered heart, that in just a few hours, months of secret affections and dazzled dewy glimpses would be for naught, reversed by a humorless fate and dwindled to platonic pleasantries, contradicting against his very orientation, to try to combine the gentleman ideal with the lady reality, to simply drop his fancies.
Kurt wipes his sopping mouth with a quivering palm, fingers flinching as if mice in a desecrated church, catching his scurrying breaths. he shuts his legs, buckle-kneed, tendons and musculature still fawn-weak and veal-tender. the way she pins him is almost—domineering, and he can't suppress a helpless shudder. “O-okay.”
“The shower is still—so I'm—” He doesn't even finish, hurrying by in haste, from the kitchen to the powder room, where the constant rinsing and draining of bath water has become frigid, tiny damp needles, the soap dissolved to thin fragments in the dish. Scrubbing brusquely with the harsh half of a sponge, spraying icy frills of water, sitting and staying and huddling in the tub until his teeth are clattering, winter-pale and bone-soaked, wrapped in the thin seasonal towels.
“Saber.” A whisper in the dark, morning beginning to dabble pastels upon a velvet night. “—I'm really sorry.”
For the misunderstandings and missteps, for such a poor Master provided to an excellent Servant—for how his mouth still tingles.
She lets him go again. She has no idea what to say to him or how to say it. What she can do to ease the conflict in his heart. That's the theme, isn't it? Figuring out what to do with a Master who is both in love with her and is also not in love with her. Or maybe to be more accurate, in love with who he thought she was. That isn't fair, really. To him or to her.
They don't really have a choice, though.
So she lets him go, listens to the sound of running water, and settles into her bed. And she waits. She thinks. She listens to sounds of the house, beyond the rush of water. The distant night sounds that filter in through the window.
The battlefield is easier than this.
His whisper brings her back to the present and her eyes flick open, as if throwing a switch.
“It'll be alright.” Tight, but understanding.
“We'll manage.”
Won't they?
“Try to get some sleep, Master. We'll figure it out in the morning.”