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The night is a quiet and calm one, when he finds her in the garden.
It is well past midnight, and the moon is high and full in the sky. Little noise travels up from the port, though the soft orange glow from the lanterns below make his path an easy one to follow. Only the odd guard remains awake in the house, and not even a light flickers from under the doors on the corridor where both his charges sleep.
That’s what made him suspicious.
There’s a party the next evening, to jointly celebrate both of their birthdays, though De Sardet turned twenty little more than a month ago. It is Constantin who hits twenty-one today, and Kurt has difficulty believing that the both of them are tucked away in their beds rather than out in the taverns.
So Kurt follows his instincts, across the courtyard and into the pretty gardens, seemingly the only part of the city that still retains any greenery. The gate at the very back has been left open, the one that leads to a stone staircase nearly as sheer as the cliff drop, and Kurt briefly wonders if he should follow it down, if only to be certain that his charges aren’t dead at the bottom of it.
He decides to close it, already thinking he might pretend to his charges that he found an assassin coming through the unlocked gate, when he turns and nearly shits himself at the sight of the figure laid across the bench on the garden balcony.
Kurt reaches for his zweihander, only to pause when he realises it’s De Sardet on the bench. She’s laid on her back, boots crossed at her ankles, with one arm resting on her stomach and the other slung across her eyes to block out the already dim light. She turns her head at the sound of his approach, and he sees her squint at him until recognition crosses her face, and the arm goes back to block her sight.
“Kurt. I thought I’d take a stroll in the gardens to enjoy the lovely night.”
He rolls his eyes. Her voice sounds like she’s trying very hard to control it, but her words are slurred and much, much louder than necessary for a garden as quiet as this.
“Green Blood…” His words are a warning, but she does not shift from the bench, instead removing her arm to look up at him properly.
“Kurt! You mustn’t close the gate, else poor Constantin won’t be able to get back in.”
He moves to stand near her, leaning against a column that supports the balcony, and looks down at her. He can smell the tavern on her, stale alcohol and the sticky smell from a wooden table that’s had one too many beers spilled on it, and beneath it the perfume she always wears, faint but there. She’s forgone her skirts in favour of breeches, and the billowing shirt she wears is sheer enough that he can see the dark colour of her jumps beneath it even in the low light (and they’re jumps, not stays, not after the debacle months ago when he knocked her on her arse a dozen times during training, when she could not dodge nor roll away from his attacks as easily due to the rigidity of them).
He knows exactly where she’s been, down at the tavern with her dear cousin, likely for more hours than even the guards will dare admit. He shifts, rolls his eyes again.
“Green Blood, I’m no idiot. You and I both know your brat of a cousin isn’t coming home till morning.”
“Constantin would never.”
“And, he’s argumentative enough to strut right through the front gates.”
De Sardet opens her eyes and tilts her head back to look at him, and once she makes eye contact she erupts into giggles. Kurt crosses his arms, though his eyes don’t leave her.
“He would, wouldn’t he.” Her own eyes close, and Kurt takes a moment to really look at her. Her dark hair is loose and long: whatever curls were in it have fallen out during the night, and the ends of it are resting perilously close to a puddle on the ground. He mostly sees her with it up for training, but he’s been told of how she wears it down in public despite her age, to hide the mark on her jaw that is so visible now. Odd, he thinks, how when he was first introduced to his charges it was so noticeable, and Constantin had shouted and kicked at him for looking at it. At ten years old the boy hadn’t done much damage, but the memory is a funny one, if only because it makes him realise that he no longer really sees it. It will always be noticeable, especially as De Sardet has grown into a beautiful woman, whose sharp features reveal clearly the mark winding down her jaw. He wonders if it would feel rough to the touch, or if it feels the same as the smooth skin on her cheek.
The thought is unwelcome and unbidden, and Kurt straightens against the column as though he’s been whipped. There’s a soft laugh from De Sardet, and he is grateful for the darkness when he realises she’s been watching him.
“Enjoying the view, Kurt?”
“Not much to look at, Green Blood.”
“Ouch, I am appalled.” De Sardet brings the hand on her stomach to rest on her chest in feigned shock, before she begins to giggle. Kurt watches as her laughter makes her roll to the side and nearly fall off the bench.
“Oh! Oh, I suppose it’s time for me to sleep, isn’t it.”
“Not my choice to make, though I won’t go easier on you in the morning if you turn up to my lessons hungover.” As if trying to prove his words, De Sardet sits up and begins to sway. Her lips are twisted in a smirk, however, and Kurt wonders if offering her his arm to steady her is a wise idea.
“Maybe I don’t want you to go easy on me.” It’s such a bad attempt at flirting that it’s almost laughable, but Kurt still finds himself wondering what the hell she’s trying to do as he lets her grip his arm. He pulls her up as De Sardet stumbles, and the ungraceful move means that she stumbles into him with one hand on his arm and the other on his shoulder. It’s so ungraceful that he’s sure it’s false, coming from the woman who occasionally chooses to cartwheel away from his sword. As if to prove his suspicions, the hand on his shoulder winds around his neck, and his level of alarm shoots through the roof at how close her face is to his own.
She erupts into more giggles, and Kurt disentangles from her and begins to drag her down the path, exasperated.
“And you’re meant to be the fucking sensible one.”
“Language, Kurt! Do you know…” She stops, giggling. “Do you know that I think you’re the most handsome man I know.” More giggles. Kurt is not religious, but he thinks about praying to whatever gods are out there that no one is around to hear her. He’ll never live it down, and he doesn’t think the Prince d’Orsay would appreciate hearing his drunken niece trying to sweet talk a coin guard ten years her senior.
“More than that pretty boy you call cousin? I think you’ve knocked your head.” He doesn’t know why the words come out and he curses himself for entertaining her, but she shakes her head with a laugh.
“No. Constantin is the prettiest boy I know, but you’re the most handsome. All the ladies at court know that.” She pauses, only meters away from the courtyard entrance, and he turns to find her looking at him wide eyed. “You can’t leave me for them, no matter how much they offer you.”
Kurt snorts, pulling on her wrist to make her move again. He doesn’t tell her that if they offer more money, he’ll have to follow it, mostly because he doubts any noble would offer more than what the Prince is paying the Coin Guard to train his heir and the spare.
He feels her chin rest on his shoulder as both her hands wrap around his arm, and his alarm rises again when she laughs and it echoes around the courtyard.
“Whatever will people say if they see you dragging me towards my rooms at this late an hour?”
Probably what he wants his last words to be, he thinks with a scoff. Kurt shakes her off, pushing her not ungently towards the staircase that leads to the living quarters.
“If you’re late to training in the morning I’ll have your lady’s maid throw ice water over you.”
Her laughter follows her up the staircase, muffled as she tries to quiet herself. He can only roll his eyes and hope she manages to make it to her bed in one piece.
Come morning, he is already in the courtyard waiting on both of his students when he hears the wooden front doors being kicked open. Constantin strolls into the courtyard, a bottle dangling between two fingers by its neck, his shirt unbuttoned halfway down his chest with a colourful array of bruises down the column of his throat.
“Kurt! What a beautiful day, is it not?” He’s still drunk, and as he gets closer Kurt wrinkles his nose. Constantin stinks of drink much as De Sardet had, only that’s hidden quite well by the overwhelming stink of sex on him. Combined with the bruises, he’s sure the lad is going to get a good hiding from his father.
He disappears up the stairs whilst singing a bawdy song, and Kurt realises De Sardet has made her way downstairs when the smell of sex is replaced with the soft scent of rosewater. He doesn’t bother trying to tell himself that she doesn’t smell nice.
“Uncle’s going to kill him.” She is to his left, adjusting her training gloves, and Kurt looks sideways over at her.
“And you, if he lets slip that you went out with him. I’m surprised you even got out of bed this morning.”
“Don’t. I don’t even remember how I got into my bed. I remember walking up those steps at the cliff, and then waking up in my bed. I thought I’d died.” She tucks her braid down the back of her collar, then smiles. “I’m surprised you’ve not given him hell for this.”
Kurt only shrugs. “He’ll get enough of it off his father, I think.”
“Aw Kurt, I think your cold mercenary mask is slipping. You’re almost being kind.”
Exasperated with the pair of them, Kurt draws his sword and De Sardet hurriedly tries to draw her own, but she is not quick enough. He disarms her in three moves, but is left even more frustrated when she only laughs at the blade at her throat.
Kurt has been watching the wine in De Sardet’s glass disappear steadily over the course of the evening, and he’s beginning to wonder if he should intervene.
There’s a party, of course, to celebrate Lady Morange’s appointment as the first governor of New Serene. Said woman had not actually been able to stay long, on account of uprooting her entire life the following morning, but the Court has been taking any excuse for a ball lately, much to the chagrin of his female student.
Kurt has kept his eye on her through this party, after she had snuck off during the previous one, though it is admittedly hard not to watch her. She is more settled this evening, dressed in summer colours and flitting around the other ladies with a smile and an enquiry into their health. Her smile is a diplomatic one, giving away very little, and she swirls the wine glass around almost half-heartedly as she speaks.
But it is too falsely casual, and from years of knowing her Kurt can see the tightness at the corner of her eyes. De Sardet has gone through three large glasses of wine in as many hours, but the only sign of her ingrained discomfort is the artfully arranged way she has styled her hair this evening. It curls and twists around the nape of her neck, pinned tightly into place against her left shoulder and discretely hiding the mark on her jaw that so many of these women spent their childhoods teasing her about.
Kurt tries not to look over at her too much, but this is not a side to her he sees often. Like this, she is easily one of the most beautiful women in the room. She always has been, but he is used to her being loud and sarcastic, hair up and usually scowling at him for disarming her. This is unusual, and though he is meant to be discretely ensuring there are no threats inside the hall, it is hard not to keep glancing over at her.
To make sure she’s okay, and that she’s comfortable, of course. Nothing more.
Ten minutes after he’s stopped looking over at her, he risks another glance and realises she’s disappeared from the room completely.
Kurt rolls his eyes, looking around for his lieutenant to tell him to keep an eye on the room whilst he drags her back, but the man is hidden somewhere opposite the crowd of people and so Kurt heads off alone.
She’s easy to find: Kurt decides to head for the most secluded balcony that faces the ocean and finds her there. She’s leaning on it heavily, far too much to be safe if she’s as drunk as she should be, and he closes the glass door to the balcony loudly so as not to startle her.
“Still thinking of running off and joining the Nauts?”
Her head turns slightly to look at him, her smile small and hidden by most of her hair. “I don’t want to join the Nauts, Kurt. I just want them to take me somewhere new.”
“Like New Serene? I’m surprised you’re not hiding at the docks, ready to sneak onto Morange’s ship.” He walks over to her, leaning into a corner of the balcony at a distance that’s not quite appropriate.
“Please, have you seen how the Nauts are with their ships? Impossible to stow away on.” She grins at him and attempts to lean on the balcony with her forearms. Kurt hears a gasp of pain before she straightens, pulling at the bottom of her stomacher with frustration. “Curse the man who decided to bring this back into women’s fashion.”
Kurt looks out at the ocean to avoid looking at her, seeing that the movement of the stomacher is pulling at the delicate, sheer fabric of the fichu around her neck and over her cleavage, and he does not need to start noticing that.
Hindered from being able to lean forward over the balcony, De Sardet turns and leans back on it with her hands. The change in position pushes her chest out, and Kurt’s beginning to wonder if she knows damn well what she’s doing. He’d blame the amount of alcohol he’s seen her go through, only her cheeks are no longer flushed.
“You’re a lot more sober than you should be, seeing how much you drank in there.”
Her laugh is like a bell, and she leans in with a smirk on her lips. Her rose perfume is still strong, and Kurt tries to ignore the fact that he likes the smell when she’s so close to him.
“I didn’t drink anything, dear Kurt. I wouldn’t trust anything I haven’t poured myself.” She pulls back, pinching hard at her cheekbones to give them a deep flush much like the one she gets when she is drunk, and Kurt realises that she must have been discreetly abandoning the drinks her guests were giving her.
“Paranoid, but smart.” He nods in approval. De Sardet smiles, pleased, and then frowns.
“I hope plants don’t react badly to wine. Constantin said it would be fine.”
“Speaking of, at what time did your cousin sneak away? I don’t remember seeing him leave, and I know you were both told to stay a few hours at least.”
She tilts her head back and laughs at his question, the column of her throat bared, and Kurt has a violently intrusive mental image of pressing his lips to her pulse point and pulling away the fichu with his hands. Alarmed, he clamps it down and turns away, but De Sardet is too busy being smug to notice.
“I thought you knew! Oh Kurt, Constantin snuck away about the same time your handsome lieutenant did. I wouldn’t do any patrols through the guest wing if you still want to look either of them in the eyes tomorrow.”
Kurt turns his head to look at her with such speed that he nearly pulls the muscles in his neck. Her smile is full of mischief, but there is no falseness in her expression, and he swears under his breath.
He really missed the ball on that one.
“Kurt! And my mother wonders where I got my language from. You don’t need to worry, I’m sure your lieutenant is only giving Constantin a lesson on how to properly handle his sword.”
Kurt doesn’t give much reaction to her comment, knowing from the feigned innocence in her face that she’s riling him up and trying to push the boundary between them. She’s been doing that a lot of late, though Kurt wonders if he only started paying attention a few months ago, when he was hit with the realisation that she was certainly no longer a girl and had abruptly packaged that observation away into a giant trunk labelled do not open.
“If you believe that, your Excellency, then you may need to have a frank talk with your cousin about his exploits.” Kurt says wryly, before straightening and moving back to the balcony door.
“On the contrary, what if I’m feeling left out? Maybe I need some private lessons to work on my sword handling.”
The smirk is back on her face in full swing, and Kurt has the surreal feeling of being cornered in the doorway when she has not even moved. Rolling his eyes, he heads through the door. “I’m going back in, seeing as I’m a guard down in the ballroom.”
De Sardet’s eyes follow him, disappointment clear in them that he has not risen to her bait. He sighs, unwilling to leave with that expression in his mind. “And I wouldn’t take lessons from that lieutenant, I’ve been told he doesn’t clean his sword between sessions.”
Her surprised laughter follows him through the door and down the corridor. If Kurt hides his smirk when he reenters the ballroom, well, no one knew it was there anyway.
Kurt is enjoying a much coveted day off in the town, rare as it is for him to both be excused from palace duties and Coin Guard ones. He has one final drink with Sieglinde, whose promotion to Major and reassignment to New Serene means that he’s likely to never see his old comrade again. It’s almost sad, for she’s one of the few people he has ever truly trusted, but she had made it clear to him that the change was one she had asked for, and he can only wish her well.
At any rate, there may be a time in the future when he does see her, for tension in the d’Orsay household has been growing of late. There are rumours swirling of Morange’s popularity in New Serene, and the Prince has begun to get nervous. Constantin’s diplomacy lessons have tripled in the last year alone, and De Sardet has found her own schedule rearranged to make room for as many lessons as can be done. Both cousins have been taking their lessons separately, but they’re seeming to stick to De Sardet extraordinarily well compared to her impatient cousin.
Her lessons are daily, overlapping with his own, and the sight of her cheering up when she enters the courtyard is enough to cool his annoyance at her tardiness. She happily chats and complains about them to him. De Sardet’s most recent complaints are about her uncle as, despite good standards during her weapons training, her posture outside of them is starting to become awful. The Prince has resorted to ensuring she wears proper stays under her clothes, and so far the only time during the day she is allowed to remove them is just before her training with Kurt.
Loathe as she is to admit it, they are working. Her balance during weapons training is already improved, and he doubts she will be forced to wear them for much longer.
“Constantin, could you pick those up for me? I’m afraid I can’t bend down in this fucking thing.” As if on cue, Kurt hears the voices of his charges over a market stall and scoffs. Of course he can’t even have a day off without them in it.
“Dear cousin, your mother might have a heart attack if she hears those words coming from your mouth.”
Kurt can’t see them, but he can hear them, and he thinks he knows what stall they’re at by the direction of their voices. He knows he shouldn’t be hovering or eavesdropping, but he’s curious. The two cousins are still as close as ever, despite them freshly turning twenty-three and twenty-four, and by right eligible for marriage. They’re not quite a package deal, as De Sardet especially has lost the outrageous mischief of her youngest years. She is more likely to be cleaning up the messes Constantin leaves behind, and more than once has she begged Kurt to help drag the blond back home before his father finds out his absence.
A heavy weight is bearing down on her cousin, leaving him with a sharp tongue that starts fights and leaves behind tears, as his quest to be so different to his father leads him right into becoming him. Both of them have refused marriage offers, Constantin because he is not in the right frame of mind for it, and De Sardet out of principle. She won’t sleep with anyone who once bullied her for her mark, she had told Kurt one morning with a wink.
“Fine, could someone please either suffocate me before my stays do, or rip them off me.”
“I could go fetch a certain soldier you’ve had your eye on. I’m sure you’ll enjoy that.” Constantin’s voice can be heard clearly, and the words make Kurt pause.
“Hilarious, really. Say that again and I’ll smack you with this box.” That makes him smirk a little, as he turns to a fruit stand to look inconspicuous.
“I just want you to be happy, cousin!”
There’s an audible sound of something soft being smacked with something heavy.
“And I just wanted to confide in you, not have you walk through the streets announcing my romantic interests to all and sundry. If he hears you…” And shit, Kurt’s not sure what they’re implying, but if one of his soldiers has gotten it into their head to try to sleep with De Sardet, it needs nipping in the bud immediately. No pretty face is worth the grief that comes from sleeping with a noble, not even hers.
“It’ll do you some good, I think, if he hears.”
“I’ve all but thrown myself at him, Constantin. I’m quite convinced there is no interest there at all. After all, what am I but the niece of the man who pays his wages? It wouldn’t be so bad if it were only an attraction, but I don’t understand why only I feel this way. It would be easier if it would go away.”
And shite, Kurt hopes she’s not gone and fallen for one of his soldiers, otherwise that’s a shitshow waiting to happen, especially if it’s only on her side. Half of his soldiers are young men who’d happily crawl into her bed if they thought it would get them a leg up, and the other half aren’t much better. He looks up, through the gap in the stalls, and sees that De Sardet is looking across at Constantin with a frown on her face.
She looks troubled, and perhaps a little bit heartsick, and Kurt realises it is more serious than it sounds. He resolves to keep an eye on her, if only to make sure that none of his soldiers take an opportunity to take advantage.
If it means that her one-on-one combat training ends up only being with him, there’s little else that can be done about that.
Both his charges fail to turn up one morning to his lessons, and Kurt knows something is off.
Had it only been Constantin, he would have ignored it and made the lad work twice as hard for it later, but De Sardet doesn’t miss a lesson be it rain or shine and, if she has to, she usually sends a note long before he’s made his way up to the palace.
He seeks them out, and it doesn’t take long to find her. He has only crossed the threshold when he notices the doors to the dining room are closed and there, in front of them, is De Sardet. She stands pin-straight, her hands fisted tightly by her side and her eyes fixed on the wall opposite. There is tension all along the lines of her shoulders: she looks like a tightly coiled spring ready to snap.
On the other side of the door, raised voices are heard. There is a moment of silence, brief, where De Sardet uncurls her wrists and seems about to relax, before it is broken by the unmistakable clap of soft flesh being hit hard.
De Sardet flinches, screwing her eyes shut for a moment, and Kurt knows immediately what is happening.
“How long?” He keeps his voice quiet, unwilling to risk losing his job just because the Prince thinks he is eavesdropping. Her eyes flicker over to his before there is a thud behind the door, and she flinches again.
“Arguing for about twenty. Five minutes since…”
“What started it this time?” Behind the door, something is thrown at the wall and smashes, and De Sardet clenches her fists so much it’s a wonder her palms don’t start bleeding. She shakes her head, keeping her eyes on the wall opposite.
“Constantin was out late last night, as per usual. Only it was me who pissed him off this morning, they were talking about New Serene and you know I don’t want to leave my mother, and I stormed off to come to training and…” She trails off for a moment, blinking back tears. “Well, you know what they’re like. He told me if I was that desperate to stay, and since I loved soldiers so much, he’d keep me here and marry me off to the head of the Coin Guard and send Constantin off to New Serene alone. He didn’t mean it, of course, but Constantin started shouting, and you can imagine the rest.”
He can, having seen first hand some of the bruises littering the pale skin of his oldest charge when he has gotten too cocky with his father. The beatings are rare things, but Constantin has always been eager to fight with his father, to rail against a man who constantly tells him he is not good enough.
Kurt has an uncomfortable feeling in his stomach, knowing that there is not much he can do to help. He may get paid a handsome amount to protect his two charges from any danger, but what the hell is he meant to do when the man who presents some of the danger they face is the one who pays him?
“You shouldn’t stay here. Listening to this isn’t going to make you feel better.”
De Sardet looks at him, tearing her eyes away from the wall to frown.
“I can’t just leave him.”
Kurt leans in, taking her upper arm and readying to drag her from the door.
“You think he wants you to listen to this? What will you do if it isn’t Constantin who opens those doors, but the Prince, and you’re in his way? Come on, training grounds, now.”
She chews at her lip, fury on her face, and for a moment Kurt genuinely thinks she’s going to try to swing for him. He hopes she calms, because he has no wish to have to drag her out of here, and she knows that if she does go for him she’ll be regretting it in training for the rest of her pretty little life.
With one long look at the door, De Sardet bites at her lip and shakes her head, storming past Kurt towards the entry doors. Kurt follows, easily keeping up with her stride.
“You know he’d never send Constantin there alone.”
De Sardet scoffs. “Of course not. Though they might as well be, sending the two of us off with no familiar faces.” She stops on the steps, turning to face him. “And why aren’t you coming with us?”
Kurt continues walking, only looking back to talk to her. “Why should I come with you? I’m your master-of-arms, not your damn babysitter.”
He sees the scowl cross her face, wants to laugh at the petulance of it. She increases her pace to catch back up with him.
“Doesn’t mean I wouldn’t want you there. I would miss you greatly, were you to stay.” I, not we, he notices. She has been doing that quite a bit lately, and Kurt can’t quite figure out if it warrants warning her that she’s crossing a line. Her hand reaches and grabs his upper arm, to stop him from walking on. “I’m serious, Kurt. If Constantin is to be Governor and I his diplomat, I will be spending a large amount of my time alone. In an unfamiliar country, with no one at my back. If you’ve nothing tying you here, then please at least think about it.”
He has thought about it. The letter sent to him weeks ago asking if he wishes to accompany his royal fledglings to Teer Fradee is still sitting in his trunk in the barracks. Alongside it, a letter warning him of future plans that are to benefit the Coin Guard.
In either event, he’s likely to be forced there no matter what he wants, but at least they’re pretending to give him a choice. He doesn’t let De Sardet know, however.
Sighing, he feels her fingers tighten on his arm. “I will think about it.” She smiles, the first time this morning, and it’s bright and honest. It makes him uncomfortably warm.
“Thank you. After all, think about all the bad fighting habits I’ll pick up without you there to correct me.”
And of course things don’t go exactly to plan the morning they’re due to leave Serene. The Naut captain gets more and more impatient with each turn that De Sardet returns to the docks without her wayward cousin, though admittedly he is sincere in his thanks when they return his cabin boy to him.
It’s only the tip of the iceberg when the creature from Teer Fradee bursts from the hold of the ship they walk past. Kurt feels damn twitchy, already on edge after De Sardet had outright propositioned him in the street, and not quite able to relax after the sheer amount of fights they’ve managed to get into this morning. He wishes he could say he’s surprised at this turn of events, but really, is he?
Only Constantin stops him from going down to join her in the fight, his arm outstretched to stop him from moving.
“No no, let her have this. A grand victory to start off her adventures!”
Kurt looks at him, incredulous. “Are you out of your fucking mind? How much alcohol have you had?”
“Kurt, she’ll be fine!” Kurt can’t quite believe that Constantin is so calm about this. They’ve faced threats before, of course, ambushes and assassination attempts that he’s trained them to fight off, but this is on another level, and it makes him nervous to watch.
“She does seem to be holding up quite well.” Captain Vasco, on the other side of Constantin, watches with his arms crossed, though his gun is held firmly in one hand.
The crack of a gunshot draws his attention back down to her, where she stands with her gun aimed at the creature. It’s no longer moving, and the three of them take the opportunity to run down to her.
Kurt reaches her first, and he notices that she’s looking down at it somewhat sadly.
“Green Blood! How do you fare?”
“Fine fine, it’s dead.” But Kurt doesn’t take that for an answer, knowing he’d seen it swipe at and connect with her side. He grabs her, hands immediately pressing at her sides to check for any wounds.
And of course, she smirks.
“I can remove my shirt if it makes it easier for you to look me over.”
He rolls his eyes, running his hands once over her ribs and arms, looking for blood. He won’t let her get to him now, of all times.
“Kurt! I must say, if you’re going to feel my cousin up, might I request you do so inside a cabin on the ship, rather than out in public! As ravishing as I’m sure you find her, you know how gossip spreads.”
Why Constantin feels the need to shout such things from only five feet away, Kurt will never know, but he does know that for only the third time that day he has the almost uncontrollable urge to wring the brat’s neck. There’s a blush coming up his neck, he knows, and he only hopes De Sardet doesn’t notice it, or she’ll only continue her teasing.
“And cousin, what a fight!” The blond wraps an arm around De Sardet’s shoulders, and she makes a half hearted attempt to shrug him off. “You were illustrious!”
Kurt tunes them out at that, but keeps his eyes fixed on De Sardet. She’s still looking at the beast with a tinge of sadness, and he’s almost certain she’s favouring her left side.
Constantin leaves them, all but jumping onto the ship with joy and excitement, Vasco on his heels with suspicion on his face. Kurt stops De Sardet before she goes up the gangway.
“You, you need your ribs examining.”
Again with the smirks. “Shall I take you to my cabin, as per my cousin’s advice?”
If he rolls his eyes any harder, Kurt thinks he might be able to see the inside of his skull.
“One day, Green Blood, I’m going to take your jokes seriously, and then what will you do?” To his dismay, her smirk only deepens, and she turns on the gangway to take a step closer to him.
“Oh, I can think of lots of things, Kurt.”
It takes all he has in him not to push her off the sides of the planks into the water.
New Serene is almost a whole new world, a world away from their old lives and the barriers they kept up between them.
Barriers that they may have been better off with staying up.
De Sardet has settled into her role as legate with grace and a smile that hides her every thought. Kurt has seen her patient with the natives, ruthless with Hikmet and San Matheus, sly with the Coin Guard and curious with the Nauts, telling them easily what they all want to hear. She delivers bad news in ways that almost make the recipients want to apologise, and her fury at Hikmet has been more than entertaining to watch as she knocks the ambassador down a peg or two.
He has seen her do all of this and still return to her friends with an honest smile, eager to help them all at the drop of a hat. She has left the oppressive nest of Serene and rather than fall, she has risen above everything they expected her to be.
And somehow, along the way, De Sardet had smashed through the box he’d successfully locked thoughts of her away in, small observations allowed to grow into things he admires about her. Things he has always known about her, her kindness and her patience, her easy smile and her penchant for bad jokes and dry humour, have evolved into things he likes about her. She has taken root in his brain and his heart in this place so far away from their old lives and their old roles. It is a painful, almost shameful truth when Kurt realises he is halfway to falling in love with her, if not already there.
It hits him when they are around the campfire one evening, a week after clearing the phantom camp. The only light comes from their fire, where De Sardet has cooked porridge, of all things. She is silhouetted by the darkness of the forest, trying to coax Siora into trying a spoonful, a laugh on her face and her hair free of the constraints of her braid. There is something about the scene that makes his throat dry, as the pieces click together in his brain and terror bubbles up inside him.
He must be staring, for Vasco follows his line of sight and whistles lowly. Kurt finds the sailor’s wineskin pushed into his hands, and doesn’t hesitate to drink.
“Looks like you’re finally catching up.” Vasco’s words are quiet and confusing, but Kurt thinks it wise not to ask.
She joins him not long after, sitting close to him as he sharpens and cleans his sword in order to check for any damage done during the fighting that afternoon. Her weight is heavy against him, and the very fact that he can’t ignore it frustrates him to no end. He has spent years with her sitting so close to him, so why is it now that he is hyper aware of every part of her that is pressed against him, her hip and her arm and the smell of her hair. She's not even talking directly to him, but every movement she makes sets his nerves on fire and he wants…
But, he shouldn’t. He’s not daft enough to not realise that.
Kurt comes back to reality when De Sardet gently bumps his shoulder with her own. He turns his head to look at her and feels his breath catch when he sees how close her face is to his. He can see every detail of her face in the light of the fire, count the freckles on her nose and the number of eyelashes on her eyelids, the bow of her lips. He feels on the edge of a momentous decision, so easy to lean in and kiss her, and if they were only alone he might have dared to.
Her eyes flicker down to his lips and then back up, and her smile is hesitant.
“Are you alright? You seem distracted.”
Distracted indeed.
“It’s nothing, Green Blood.”
“It doesn’t seem like nothing. You’ve been quiet since we left that camp last week. I saw how you looked when we went in there. It’s not the first time you’ve been in a camp like that, is it?” Her words are spoken softly, loud enough only for him to hear.
Kurt curses inwardly. He has been quiet since then, he cannot deny that, but that is not the cause of the last hour’s silence. She’s right though, of course, though the camp he remembers was even worse than what they found hidden in the forests.
“It isn’t, no. But I hope more than anything that it is the last.” De Sardet reaches out a hand to gently touch his forearm, and the comforting squeeze she gives it is so light it seems as though she is worried he will turn skittish and flee.
“I know there is nothing I can say that will make this easier, Kurt. Just… know that we’re here if you need us. If there’s anything you need us to do, you need only ask.”
His nod is sharp, uncertain what he can say in response, and he turns his gaze back to the fire. They sit in companionable silence as the rest of the group chatters on, though out of the corner of his eye he begins to see her nodding off and then jolting herself awake as the weight of her pressed against him becomes heavier.
Ten minutes pass, and he is surprised when he feels her rest her head on his shoulder. It cannot be comfortable, for she is nearly of a height with him, but her eyes are closed and her breathing comes slowly, and she seems content to doze there.
Kurt knows he should move her, shouldn’t let her break down the last barrier between them. Casual touches are not something De Sardet has ever done outside of being drunk, and it’s another professional barrier she is kicking her way through, and Kurt’s not sure how long he can last before he breaks if she keeps this up. He is used to the recent intrusive, inappropriate thoughts, of pushing her up against the door of her bedroom, of having her writhe beneath him in all manner of ridiculous settings, but those are easily dismissed as the lustful mind of a man travelling in frequent contact with a beautiful woman.
But this. This is tenderness, looking forward to her company and finding his day easier for having her in it, for wanting to see her if only to have her smile at him, wanting not just to sleep with her but to stay with her, spend more than just a quick few hours in her bed.
And that, tenderness, he’s not sure what to do with.
In San Matheus, De Sardet turns twenty-five and orders them to spend ‘fun’ time together, and spends the evening with her friends in the coin tavern. They stumble back to the diplomat’s house in one big group, though to Kurt’s surprise it’s Vasco’s shoulder she leans heavily on, loudly lamenting the loss of her money at cards.
It makes something ugly in his stomach twist, but she ascends her stairs alone as the others filter off into their own rooms on the ground floor.
They are due to leave the next morning. He goes to her room at her request, to find her standing over a map as she plots their route back to New Serene. She’s fully dressed, probably the only one of them to be at this time of the morning, and there are packs spread across the floor at the foot of her bed. She holds a potion in her hand, several bottles sitting on the table around the map. Light filters in through the window, catching her hair, and Kurt knows he’s fallen too far. He wants to reach out, run his fingers through the dark curls that fall over her shoulders.
There’s a mix of jealousy and panic when he thinks of the way she was with Vasco the previous evening, the way she had laughed with the sailor, stolen his hat and made them laugh with her impression of him. She bonds with others by making them laugh, and he wonders if there is more than friendship with what she is building with the other captain.
“You’re awfully quiet in that doorway, Kurt.” De Sardet speaks, breaking his thoughts. He has not taken his eyes off her, though she glances briefly at him before looking at her potion bottles. There is a small, fond smile twisting at her lips.
“Just thinking, Green Blood.” Kurt refuses to look anywhere but the small area she is occupying, unwilling to give his fantasies more material to work with if he knows the colour of her bedsheets, the exact amount of steps between the doorway and the bed.
“Anything interesting?”
You, he thinks, but does not, cannot, say.
“Ah, no.” He inclines his head towards a pile of letters on her windowsill. “And you? That’s a lot of letters for how little time we’ve spent here.”
De Sardet waves her hand lazily at them, focusing instead on trying to stick a label onto a funny coloured potion. “No. A few requests for help, a bounty, and a couple of courting requests.” She says the last part with her gaze on Kurt, as though trying to gauge his reaction.
He frowns, wondering how he had forgotten that she was, and still is, one of the most eligible women on this damn island. Diplomatically powerful and physically beautiful in spite of the mark, she’s a powerful spouse to have, never mind that she remains one of the few nobles from Serene on the island. They are worlds apart in class and age, and he cannot continue wanting.
“Anyone caught your eye?” Kurt curses himself for even asking, knowing he doesn’t really want to know the answer. De Sardet stills, the fingers of one hand still pressing down a label, and her eyes flicker up to Kurt.
“Oh, someone’s definitely caught my eye, Kurt, but it’s not one of them. My heart is set on someone a little closer to home.” Kurt completely misses the meaningfulness in her gaze, the way that she is pushing him towards a revelation. He only thinks of the night before, of her drunkenly linking arms with the sailor, sitting next to him at the long tables.
“Vasco is a good man, Green Blood, though I can’t say I think it wise to choose a man who spends most of his life at sea.”
Kurt is trying vainly to appear nonchalant, but the moment the words leave his mouth he knows that he has been wrong in that assumption. De Sardet lowers the bottle in her hand, her mouth slightly open and her eyebrows furrowed, a look of perfect confusion on her face.
Her eyes narrow a second later, and her expression becomes offended.
“You… you cannot be… excuse me?” She is lost for words, and Kurt realises he has guessed wrong.
“I know you tend to fall for the ones you can’t have, Green Blood. I know you fell for one of my guards back in Serene, and perhaps you’re thinking of Vasco now, but waiting on land for a Naut to return every few months isn’t going to be good for you."
De Sardet looks as though she’s ready to throw the potion at him, side effects be damned.
“One of your guards? Kurt, did you by any chance happen to leave your brain in Serene?”
And shite, did he get that one wrong too? Her face is a mix of offence and absolute disbelief as she puts the bottle down on the table, leaning against it with her hands as she peers up at him.
“You genuinely believed that I was in love with Vasco? Or one of your guards? I can’t even begin to understand where you got that idea from.” Kurt keeps his eyes on her, but nods. The outrage drains from her face as she sinks a little, and she looks more like she is sad at what she is hearing. “You cannot be serious.”
“Sorry, Green Blood, I misjudged the situation.”
“You’re damn right you did, Kurt. There has been only one man who I have loved, and some days I think he is the only man I will ever love, fool that I am.”
Those words hurt, make his throat feel dry and his stomach twist in knots. Kurt supposes it’s as good a warning to him as anything, though he wonders who on this world could have caught her attention so. He knows of her paramours in Serene, the small number of men she would allow into her bed only on drunken nights, but even that had stopped by the age of twenty. Who did she know who could still hold her heart after five years?
Who would have had the strength to turn her away? To not notice her? Even by eighteen it had been obvious that she was going to turn out beautiful, the mark on her face be damned.
Her eyes are on him, sharp and meaningful, and it feels as though they’re on a sword edge, ready to fall. Kurt clears his throat.
“Then whoever that man is, he is the fool, not you, if you don’t mind me saying.”
He turns to leave, not sure what else to say. De Sardet’s hands have moved to one of her measuring instruments, her eyes back on the map, unable to meet his gaze.
“Would to the gods you were a fool, Kurt. It might have made things easier for us all.”
He does not hear her words as he goes down the stairs, and forgets that he had not even asked her why she had summoned him to her rooms.
“Standing behind every one of you is one of our men. You are completely at our mercy.”
De Sardet is stunned, the shock of Kurt’s harsh voice breaking her down to her bones. It is happening too quickly, his storming into the room and the veiled implications in his words, but that particular threat of mercy moves her into action.
She pushes Constantin back, standing firmly in front of him, her heart hammering in her chest. It is a heartbreaking betrayal that he even knows so much of this plan and had not breathed a word of it to her, but he will have Constantin over her dead body and nothing less.
She steps closer to him, her brow furrowed into fury, and knows that he can see the clench of her jaw as she stands before him. She is so far into his personal space that it makes him uncomfortable, and she knows that he knows it is her aim. She is almost of a height with him, and the increasingly small distance between her lips and his own is painful.
De Sardet shakes her head, one hand tightly gripping the handle of her sword.
“No. Not you.”
No, not him. For he is warning them, not turning against them.
“Why tell us this?” Constantin asks from behind her, and Kurt lowers his eyes to the ground.
“I’ve known both of you a long time. Too long. I’ve come to know you, to respect you, and I’ve never reneged on a contract. These orders go against all that I am. A cold hearted mercenary, definitely, but never a traitor.”
De Sardet’s lips curl up into a sneer, and as she releases her grip on her sword, Kurt meets her gaze.
“A contract. Is that all we are to you? You hesitate to stab us in the back not out of loyalty to us, but to your contract. You would slit my throat had you but known me a few years less?”
“Were that the case, Green Blood, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. You have been forewarned. You must take action.”
The anger leaves her, replaced with urgency as the sense of the danger kicks in. She nods, once.
“I will not forget this, Kurt. Constantin, we need to get you to safety.”
She turns away, to plan their route to the cellars via the attic, and Kurt isn’t sure if her words are a thanks or a threat.
De Sardet will not meet his eyes, not even when the coup is over and the three cities made safe.
She looks in his direction when he speaks, but her eyes are fixed on his collar, and her smile is that awful brittle smile she gives those she cannot bear to look at, sugary sweet but utterly false. She takes him out on their excursions still, but she does not join them at the campfire. Whereas he has grown used to fighting with her on his other side, she has begun to fight from a distance, relying on her guns and small arsenal of spells to fight, her mind too heavy for melee combat. Something is dragging her down beneath the water, and nothing they can do seems to pull her back to the surface.
Things hit a breaking point a week after the attempted coup, when their search for the tierna harh cadachtas goes wrong. Mev lies behind them, unconscious but still whimpering in pain as Siora staunches the blood flow from her wound. Kurt stands to the right of De Sardet, whose gun hangs loosely from her fingers as she stares at the Bridge Alliance man. The would-be assassin begs for his life, and Kurt knows how the situation is going to play out.
For De Sardet is merciful to a fault at times, pushing for resolution over violence, a pacifist in an ideal world and only forced to fight in this unideal one. Her eyes are on the man as he speaks, her head cocked to the side though her face betrays nothing. She will frown, furrow her brows in annoyance but ultimately grant him mercy and a prison cell, and Kurt will have to watch their backs as they take the tierna back to the village.
De Sardet’s lips part slightly as her nostrils flare, the sure sign of an oncoming sneer. In one smooth movement she raises her arm and presses the barrel of her pistol to the wrinkled flesh of the man’s forehead.
She pulls the trigger.
The gunshot is deafening, swallowing the last of the man’s words as he is briefly hidden from Kurt’s view by a cloud of smoke. The recoil forces De Sardet’s arm up, and the gold inlay glints through the smoke. The man falls backwards, into the globs of blood and brain matter splattered over the grass.
It happens in what cannot be more than a few seconds, her movement so fluid and quick that the man cannot have even noticed, nor have had time to try to defend himself.
Kurt looks across at her, unable to feel anything but rising shock. De Sardet lowers her arm, wiping the barrel off in the cloth of her cape.
“Close your mouth, Kurt, lest you wish to catch flies.”
“What the fuck, Green Blood?”
She looks up at him, one hand still holding the gun, and it’s the first time she’s made eye contact with him since the attempted coup.
“He tried to kill me.”
Just like that, so blasé and uncaring, De Sardet puts the pistol back into the holder at her hip and turns on her heel to join Siora. She does not look back, not at Kurt or the man whose skull she has just put a bullet through. Kurt watches her go, personally not giving a shit about the man, but worried for the woman who he knows this action will take a toll on.
Kurt decides the only resolution is confrontation, and heads for her home the day they return to New Serene.
He is surprised to see Aphra and Vasco outside, sitting on the crates and playing cards.
“She doesn’t want any of us in there for a few hours.” Vasco says by way of greeting, and Kurt frowns, worried.
“We suspect she might be drunk.” Aphra adds, answering the question he was about to ask.
“Right.” He’s not sure what to say to that, only he’s surprised when they both quickly pack up and prepare to leave once it’s obvious he’s about to go into the house.
De Sardet isn’t in the parlour or the dining room, and he doubts he’ll find her in one of the spare bedrooms. He heads straight for her study, and knows she’s in there when the smell of a brewery hits him once the door opens.
She’s sat lazily in her chair, her legs propped up on her desk and a bottle of rum next to them. She spreads her arms in sarcastic greeting once she sees him enter, and the grin on her face is heartbreakingly false.
“Ah, the cold hearted mercenary appears. Do just step right in, show us all how easily you bypass my security.”
He elects not to tell her that as the man in charge of her protection, no one can stop him. He suspects that will make her more angry. Instead, he swipes the bottle of rum from the table, unable to believe someone as highborn as she is drinking such swill.
“Hey! Give that back!” Her legs swing down off the desk, but the movement is too fast and she sways in her seat. She’s flushed red, the alcohol sending a pattern of pink and red down her face and neck and into the deep cut of her half-unbuttoned blouse. There are red marks on her face, as though she has clawed at her cheeks in frustration, and though her eyes are dry they are red and bloodshot.
“What are you doing, Green Blood?”
“Don’t call me that!” Her words are a snarl, enough of a surprise that Kurt takes a step closer, peering at her closely.
“What is this about?” He puts the rum down out of her reach and stares her down. Her chin is tilted up towards him, and her face is set in a childish stubbornness he has not seen on her for nearly a decade. Her dark hair is down, but there’s no soft curls framing her face this time. It looks as though it hasn’t been brushed in a day, and he realises that for the first time since they’ve arrived on New Serene, the diplomat has lost her mask.
The realisation must show on his face, for De Sardet’s lip trembles slightly and her body leans forward, her elbows resting on the desk.
The floodgates open.
The tears are so sudden, so violent and angry, that Kurt can’t do much but stare in horror from the other side of the desk. Not once, in over a decade of knowing her, has he seen her in such a state. The cruellest of childhood bullies had never made her budge an inch, nor the rare fights with Constantin or the harshest days of her weapons training had reduced her to this. Even her mother’s diagnosis of the malichor plague had not brought her to tears in front of him.
De Sardet covers her eyes with her hands, hearing rather than seeing Kurt lower himself into the chair opposite her. It infuriates her that she is letting him see her so weak, angers her more that he is the cause of part of her pain. She feels thin and brittle, stretched to her limits and stuck with a mental block so high she cannot scale it. Everyone needs something from her, Hikmet and their cure, Theleme and their messiah, the Nauts and the Coin Guard and it’s too much, too much to do.
And Constantin, who needs a cure for the malichor, her dear cousin and her staunchest ally. And Kurt, whose almost-betrayal stings far more than the rest, as much as she tells herself she should have known better. It has only been a recent thing, him referring to her as his friend. De Sardet wonders, if she had not helped him with his personal requests, would he have turned against her? She feels foolish and naive for loving him, for giving him so much of herself over the years with nothing in return, if her repayment is to simply not have a knife in her spine and her cousin murdered.
De Sardet feels like she is crumbling. She needs comfort, something to assuage the heartache of Constantin’s diagnosis and the shock of a friendship not being what it seems. She needs her mother.
She feels a fresh wave of tears, hot and wet, run down her cheeks, because not even that is right. She wishes she’d never known, never discovered that her mother is not really that. De Sardet wants answers to questions she can never ask. It has been too easy to pretend her mother is still in Serene until a letter tells her otherwise, but the wish for comfort forces her to face the reality that her mother is likely long dead, succumbed to the malichor. Constantin will likely follow if she does not find a cure fast enough.
Any port in a storm, but there are no harbours here for her to take shelter in, and De Sardet feels shockingly alone in a world that’s too big for her.
As for Kurt, he knows it’s better for whatever she’s feeling to be out rather than in, but he is little versed in offering comfort and so he simply lets her cry for a few moments before he tries to gently pull her hands from her face. De Sardet snatches her hands back and rubs furiously at her cheeks, now all blotchy and red from her tears.
“Is this about what happened with the guard last week?”
Finally, De Sardet looks him in the eyes, and the look lances through him like a spear.
“You told me, Kurt, that finding pleasure in discovering new aspects of one another’s personality was half the fun of a relationship. That whole mess with the guard was not an aspect I enjoyed discovering, let me tell you.” Her words are unsteady, still affected by the alcohol, and her fingers press tightly into her temple to ward off what is likely a painful headache.
“I wouldn’t have betrayed you, Green Blood.” He does not know what else he can say, not in the face of her anger.
“Wouldn’t you? I find it hard to believe you weren’t told of the plan before the day of the coup, Kurt. Which means you sat on that information for some time.”
And there is nothing he can say to that, because it is true. He had been warned of a possible plot, in coded whispers meant to test the waters of his reaction, but that had been in another world, one where she was simply his student and he her instructor. She had been firmly packed away in a box labelled work, and he had ensured a barrier stood between them the moment she came of age lest anyone get any wrong ideas.
That barrier had shattered once they were in New Serene, sharing her campfire and her confidence, when their time together became greater than their time apart, and she had not needed any time at all to adjust to their sudden closeness. She could no longer be packed away into a box he could not open, not when she stood so close to him, small touches on his arm or his hand, her head on his shoulder whenever she fell asleep sitting up at the campfire.
“I know you’re angry about it, Green Blood, but I don’t quite know why the what ifs are upsetting you so much.” The words leave his mouth as he thinks it, but her response is a wry quirk of her lips and a self-pitying expression, and Kurt feels on the edge of that sword once more.
“You said you’d known us too long. As though it were a burden. As though a year or two less would make it easier to slit our throats. As though you’d almost rather you could.” Her voice lifts at that last part, and she swallows another sting of tears.
“Then you’re wrong, or I could have worded it better.”
“I don’t think I am, and that’s what hurts, Kurt.” She stands up unsteadily, though once she gets her bearings she begins to pace. “I have spent the last few years trusting you, really trusting you even though I knew I shouldn’t have, because you were there for the pay, not for me. I have given you so much of myself and I didn’t even realise, and it was never conditional, never. I fell damn hard, and I knew you’d never reciprocate, but did you have to pull the rug out from under me like that? What even am I to you?”
Everything.
“I- I don’t know.” It’s as honest as he can be, given the internal struggle that’s been plaguing him for months now. De Sardet laughs dejectedly.
“I don’t even know if that’s worse, or better, than simply your student or your friend. I thought I’d been obvious all these years, but if you thought only a few months ago that I wanted Vasco then clearly I haven’t been obvious enough. It was always you, and that’s what makes this hurt so much.”
Kurt stares at her, eyes following her as she paces back and forth next to the desk. Her words shake him, if only because it is all news to him, no matter what she says. He has spent weeks struggling with the realisation that she is everything he wants, chastising himself for feeling this way about her, only for her to admit the same in a drunken rage. He stands up from the chair, knowing he does not have a way with words, not like she does, but De Sardet goes on.
“And, and this week’s just been so shitty, with Constantin and the truth about my birth and you, you were the last rock I had to cling to and I’m so angry that it’s affecting me so much.” She stops her pacing, turning her head back to look at him, and he reaches out to grab her arm to shut her up. He needs to explain, to show her and make her understand.
De Sardet misreads the look on his face for something else, he knows not what, and the odd crackle at the back of his neck is all the warning he gets before her fingers curl tightly and then flex, quick and sharp like a pulse.
The stasis spell she holds him in is strong, stronger than it had ever been in Serene (and he has Petrus to thank for that, he’s sure), and it feels like a heavy weight is crushing his chest. De Sardet looks down at her hand in guilty surprise before she seizes the opportunity to flee, out of his sight and out of the house before the spell wears off.
By the time Kurt recovers from the spell and stumbles out the front door, De Sardet has long disappeared into the night. The square is silent, lit only by the soft glow of the lamps and the moon, and the few people who wander the streets are only guards and the odd citizen. Were she anyone else, Kurt would head inside and wait for her return, knowing the chances of finding her in New Serene at this time of the night is low indeed.
But she is not anyone else, she is a woman he has known for nearly fifteen years, and Kurt knows exactly where she goes whenever she feels trapped and alone. He heads towards the port, walking at a slower pace to give her chance to calm down before he gets there. The docks are as quiet as the rest of the town, though he feels the eyes of a dock worker on him as he walks. He heads towards the secluded little jetty over the ocean, the one well hidden by barrels, and there, sitting on the edge with her legs dangling over the water, is De Sardet.
He walks down it quietly, though his boots make more noise than he intends to. De Sardet leans forward slightly, her hands folded in her lap, making small sniffling noises as she stares down at the water beneath her. Kurt decides to sit next to her, and sees her watching him out of the corner of her eyes as he makes himself comfortable.
They sit quietly for a while, De Sardet watching the ocean and the faint light of distant ships, and Kurt watching her as she chews at her lip. He tries to think of something to say, wishing he had her aptitude for saying the right thing.
“I knew about the coup attempt before we left Serene. It was a smart plan, but once I knew that they wanted the governors dead rather than ransomed back to the continent, I couldn’t do it. But if I’d warned you, and they’d have known if I did, then they would have put someone else on the job, and they would have waited till we were out of the city to strike. I could never have betrayed you. I care about you too much to have hurt you like that.”
It is the first time he has admitted that aloud, the first time he has acknowledged to anyone but his own mind that he has feelings for her, and even then he can’t bring himself to tell her just how strong those feelings are, still using ambiguous language that wouldn’t sound any different being said platonically. Kurt can’t even say what it is that makes him fearful to do it, only that it feels as though a barrier throws itself up each time he tries to voice it.
De Sardet does look up at his confession, her lips twisted downwards in what looks like a vain attempt at trying to stop more tears from coming. Her eyes go back down to her hands to distract herself, and Kurt sighs. There’s nothing else for it.
He is not affectionate by any means and never has been, having had any lingering traces of it beaten out of him during his teenage years, but he cannot offer words of comfort and he cannot sit and listen to her sad little sobs either. Firmly, but not ungently, he wraps an arm around her and pulls her to him. She resists for only a second before she goes easily, letting out a shuddering breath and leaning heavily against his chest. Kurt presses the lightest of kisses to her hair, feeling her tighten her fingers into the fabric of his doublet at his chest and his lower back where she holds tight to him, allowing her tears to fall with much less anger than before.
They don’t stay there for long, only long enough for it to feel like the alcohol is catching up with De Sardet, when her tears stop and sleep starts to take her. Kurt helps her to her feet, guiding her the short distance back to the house as she blinks blearily at her surroundings.
He stays with her, after he’s managed to convince her to go to bed, if only to be sure that she doesn’t vomit in her sleep. Leaning forward in the chair he’s seated himself on, Kurt runs a hand over his face and tries to think of what the fuck to do.
At the very least, he hopes the situation over the attempted coup has been resolved, if only because the tension caused by her distress is hard enough to handle without added tension between the two of them. But much of her emotional distress comes from Constantin’s illness and the revelation about her mother, and Kurt can do little to help with that apart from staying supportive and at her side, as with the rest of their companions.
But for the other issue, the fact of their feelings for one another, Kurt thinks he needs a week of solitude just to wade through it all. How on earth he managed to miss it, he has no idea, but he knows she spoke the truth to him. If he thinks hard enough, he can pinpoint every moment she had tried to knock down the professional barrier he’d put up between them, every time she had just crossed the line. Years of flirtation that he had taken as teasing, unwilling to even consider it. Gods, she had spent every moment she could spare with him, when he thinks on it, and once in New Serene she had upped the ante. She certainly wasn’t treating him the same as she treated the others, with her staying by his side long into the evenings and setting up her bedroll next to his.
He has spent so long of his time in New Serene trying to bury his feelings for her, that he failed to notice she was no longer trying to be subtle about her own.
But there are still ghosts in his past that have not yet been put to rest, and he doesn’t think he’ll ever feel secure or safe enough to allow their relationship to change whilst that remains the case. For the moment she is safe from those ghosts, but that could change quickly if it became known that he is not quite the cold hearted mercenary when it comes to her.
He leaves quietly, once he’s sure she’s not going to be ill, but gets little sleep of his own that night.
Things return mostly to normal between them, and though De Sardet makes no mention of what happened that night, she seems to be more grounded than before.
Perhaps there’s something to the method of getting blind drunk and crying your troubles out.
But still, her smiles are sincere again, though they do not come as freely to him. There is still some tension between them, but both of them do what they can to lessen it. She keeps polite conversation with him, confides in him her troubles, and though it’s tense it’s by no means awkward. Yet De Sardet no longer sits as close by the campfire, and her terrible dirty jokes have all but disappeared. Kurt is shocked to find himself disappointed when he injures his leg one day, and she bandages him up in a tent with a serious face and not a smirk or joke in sight.
She treats him exactly as a good friend should, the same as she treats the others, and it forces Kurt into a realisation that this is not what he wants.
He is free.
Kurt can’t quite believe it, turning it over in his head as they leave the warehouse in San Matheus. It is not how he imagined it, it does not feel like the weight of the world is gone from his shoulders, like he can do anything and everything knowing the bastard spectre that haunted him will be burning on a pyre come the morrow.
But it does feel good, like a dark shadow dogging his footsteps has been banished. He feels like he can tentatively imagine a future, cautiously hope that he can have an aim in life beyond surviving to the next day. As he watches Hermann carted off by the Ordo Luminis, Petrus in tow to ensure he arrives in the right cell, it feels more like the dagger pressed against his spine has been knocked away.
On the way back to De Sardet’s residence, he tells her it all when she asks what Hermann had done to him. At one point she stops, shocked, but it is late and the street is mercifully quiet, so he feels no need to hush his words.
“Now that he is gone, Kurt, will you begin to think about your future?” There is something off in her voice as she speaks, her eyes fixed on his shoulder rather than on his own, despite the confidence she projects with her hand on her hip.
“I hope so, for the first time I feel free to be able to do so.”
Her eyes slide up to meet his, and he sees the hesitation in them, the fear. “I hope I can be a part of it.”
And really, the thought that she wouldn’t be is so laughable but, rather than fumble through an explanation of it, for once in his life Kurt decides to throw his caution to the wind.
Surprise crosses her face when he grabs the lapels of her coat and walks her backwards towards the wall of the arch they’re standing under. She does not stumble, and any words about to leave her mouth are cut off when his lips meet hers before he’s even pressed her against the wall properly.
The kiss is hard and messy, but De Sardet’s lips part easily beneath his own as her arms manoeuvre under his and up around his neck. She pulls him impossibly closer, her chest flush against his own when he moves his hands down, one gripping at her hip and the other snaking underneath her coat to rest flat on her back. It’s an awkward position, with nowhere for her hands to cling to with his gorget and pauldrons on, and her with too many layers and a wall at her back, and gods what he wouldn’t do to have all the layers of metal and leather between them to just vanish, to be able to feel her beneath his fingertips. He moves his hands up to cup her face, his fingers threading into her hair as he tilts her head back, deepening the kiss.
De Sardet’s breaths are ragged once she parts for air, though she does not pull away and his grip on her remains tight.
“Is that a yes?”
Kurt huffs out a laugh at her words and shakes his head, though the pleased look on her face tells him she knows the answer. There’s delight dancing in her eyes as she shifts beneath him, and he becomes acutely aware of how entangled their legs are when her thigh rubs against the hardness in his trousers.
The smirk she gives him lets him know that she is well aware of it. “Is that my gun or yours?”
He wonders if she flirts badly on purpose, if this is what she has been reduced to after years of him missing her hints. He silences her laugh with another kiss, and when he pulls away her cheeks are flushed.
“Spend some time with me, away from the others.” Kurt keeps his voice low, as De Sardet lowers her hands from his neck and fiddles with one of the three leather straps on his chest. There is a knowing smile on her face as she looks down at them, and she pointedly looks to her right before making eye contact with him again.
“My house here in San Matheus is empty right now, you know. And, if you’d only dragged me ten feet in that direction, we’d already be inside it.”
He follows the tilt of her head and realises, belatedly, that they are in fact under the archway directly opposite her house. He takes some satisfaction when her smile turns into surprise, as he grabs her wrist and pulls her in the direction of the front door.
“Are you trying to scandalise the good people of San Matheus?” She has a point, but Kurt ignores it seeing as she speaks louder than necessary, and the streets are practically empty. Once inside, he slides the lock across the door. The gauntlets are the first to go, as he turns to face De Sardet and kisses her as before. This time, there’s no barriers between his fingers and the smooth skin of her jaw as he trails his fingers up it, before burying them in the softness of her hair and kissing her like his life depends on it.
When he breaks apart to undo the scarf at her neck, he feels her laugh shallowly against his cheek. “You can’t… you can’t lock the others out.”
Unbidden, he remembers a balcony five years earlier, and an urge to pull away the sheer fichu that had been at her neck then. It had been wrong, back then, but now. He pulls the scarf away, throwing it in the direction of one of the tables before he begins to leave a trail of hot open-mouth kisses down the column of her throat. The soft moan he gets in response makes heat pool in his stomach. Behind him, he can feel her trying to tug her own gloves off.
“Yes I bloody well can-“
“I spent five years dropping hints, Kurt…” She trails off, swallowing thickly as she wriggles out of her coat. “Tell me, what did I do to get this? I’ll make sure I do it again.” With her hands finally free of her gloves and her arms no longer restricted by her coat, she begins to remove his armour. His gorget and pauldrons clang as they hit the floor, but Kurt pays it no attention as he recaptures her lips.
Her hands move down his chest, but it is hard to undo the straps on his armour when he is kissing her so thoroughly, and De Sardet pulls back with a moan of frustration.
“Why in the name of the gods do you have so many belts?”
He laughs at that, an honest proper laugh that whispers along her lips, and she lets go of him.
“I’m so glad you find this funny.” She turns to her own belts, her sword clattering to the floor once that is undone, though she has the sense to put her gun holster on the fireplace. He is barely done with his own armour and weapons when she pulls him towards the stairs, and really, what else can he do but follow? It feels scandalous, leaving a trail of clothing on the floor, but with the locked door the house is and will remain empty.
At the top of the steps he stops her again, backing her into the wall of her bedroom and pinning her there with another kiss. She pushes his doublet off his shoulders, leaving him with only his undershirt on, and her hands go straight under it to run her fingers along his back. He tenses when her nails drag lightly across a litany of scars, so she brings her hands back around to the front and moves to pull his shirt off completely.
And gods, she can’t help but reach out to touch, to run her hands over every inch of him she has exposed, even as he pulls back to look at the expression on her face. She understands why, knows he must be self conscious about the numbers of scars even as old as they are. But he only sees want in her eyes, and none of the disappointment he’d feared to see. In one swift movement she removes her own shirt, leaving her in only her jumps, and he stops her when she goes in to kiss him again.
“Are you sure you want to do this? I’m still just a soldier-“ He is cut off by her groan of frustration, and she leans forwards to wrap her arms around his neck. He can feel the heat from her skin, so close, but he has to be sure she won’t regret this.
“Kurt, I’ve been trying for five years to get you into my bed. If you make me wait out of some misplaced sense of chivalry, when the bed is right there…” She doesn’t finish, instead surging forward to kiss him hard and messy. She presses flush to him, her skin warm against his, and it’s almost dizzying combined with how desperate her kiss is.
Kurt lifts her as she goes easily, supporting her by her thighs as she wraps her legs around his waist. It presses her directly against the throbbing need in his trousers, and there’s still too much clothing between them when she rolls her hips, her lips moving into a smirk against his own. Her hands are now cupping his jaw, and as she pulls back she rubs her thumb over the scar on his lip.
“Bed.” The words are whispered against his lips and accompanied with another roll of her hips, and Kurt could not say no even if he wanted to. He drops her gently onto the bed, and De Sardet surprises him once again when she reverses their positions the moment he joins her on it. She straddles him, pushing him into the bed with one hand as she sits up. Her free hand moves to her hair, unpinning the wrap-around braid she has in and shaking it out with her fingers.
Once she’s done with it, Kurt hooks his fingers into the front of her jumps and uses it to pull her down, back to a kiss even as he makes short work of the front fastening. She laughs as he pulls her to him, shifting to make it easier for him to slide the jumps down her arms. She doesn’t care that it makes for a messy kiss, as she throws them to the side and holds herself up with her hands on either side of his shoulders.
For a moment they pause, taking the other in, and the unbridled joy and want in her eyes makes him wonder how he’d ever kept away this long. She breaks the moment with a rocking of her hips, and Kurt uses a hand on the back of her neck to drag her down to him. De Sardet feels his other hand running a line down the dip of her spine, making her shiver in anticipation. To her surprise, when their lips meet the kiss is long and slow, and she savours it. The heat of his bare chest against her own is dizzying, and she gets the feeling that this is the first time he’s allowed himself true intimacy with a bedmate.
She is right, of course, though Kurt is also giving her a last opportunity to back away, to detach herself from him before it goes any further. He feels her fingers gently trace a pattern down his chest, down past his stomach and over his abdomen, stopping at the ties to his breeches as her fingers tap over the laces. Pulling away, she looks down at him with the same question in her eyes.
One last chance to back out, before they can no longer be defined by the professional relationship that they’re supposed to be to each other.
Kurt tilts his head up and kisses her fiercely, as she pulls the laces loose.
There is little coherent conversation after that.
The rising sun streaming in through the windows the next morning is what wakes Kurt up, combined with the heavy warmth in his bones and the odd sound of a page being turned in a book. He shifts in confusion, still half asleep, and opens his eyes to find De Sardet sitting up in the bed next to him, the sheet pulled up to her chest and an alchemy book open on her lap.
Memories of the night before come flooding back to him, sending his blood south as he remembers the sight of her above and beneath him, the smell and taste of her on his lips. For a moment he simply lays there and admires the sight of her, hair messy and her skin lightly pink from the warmth of the room. She holds the book with one hand, the other curled on her chest with the top of the bedsheet, and there's a content smile on her face. It is such a painfully domestic sight that Kurt feels almost as though he is dreaming, expecting her to disappear into smoke when he blinks.
It's a sight he'll happily wake up to every morning, if she'll have him. He had been surprised at how easy it was to fall asleep with her in his arms, especially considering he has never shared a bed in his life. It's an element of intimacy he's never wanted or allowed with any partner, but one he almost craves with De Sardet. Even now, he wants nothing more than to drag her back down into the bed and kiss her long and slow, to feel every curve beneath him and watch her unravel before him. Moving his arm beneath the sheets, he reaches out and finds her knee, softly sliding his hand up her thigh. The soft expression on her face becomes fond as she holds back a grin.
“You’re awake.” De Sardet snaps the book shut and puts it on the side table, shuffling down the bed until she can lay comfortably on her side, one elbow propping her up with her head resting in her hand. Her smile is warm when she looks down at him. “Here I was beginning to think you’d only slept with me for the opportunity to sleep in my bed.”
“It is better than that concrete slab downstairs in New Serene that you call a bed.”
Trailing her fingers down his chest, she hums softly. “Perhaps I was trying to give you incentive to seek out another, more comfortable one.”
Had he known it would be like this, he’d have gone to her sooner. He says as much, and De Sardet gently grazes her knuckles across his jaw.
“In my defense, Kurt, I had you here in this very room months ago, when I told you I had my eye on someone closer to home.”
He can only shake his head at his blindness, remembering now the way she had looked at him as she spoke those words.
“Don’t think about it. You’re here now.” She smirks, lifting the sheets. “And ready to go again, by the looks of it.”
And he would, desperately wants to after the night before, when she had awoken him and coaxed him into a second round of sex. It had been even more passionate, both of them lasting longer than the hurried first time. But something worries him, for she had taken no potions and he had finished inside her on both occasions.
“Should you… do we need to go to an alchemist?”
The smirk on her face should worry him, but she leans down over him and kisses him deeply. He runs his hand up her arm and around the back of her neck, holding her there, when he notices an earthy taste to her that doesn’t seem natural. When she pulls back, she’s still smirking.
“Fear not, there’ll be no miniature Kurts running around in nine months. I took a large dose of laserwort an hour ago. Which means you have about eight hours before my monthly makes an early appearance. I'll brew proper potions back in New Serene.”
He wants to ask why she had laserwort on hand, before remembering that this is the woman who happily carries full armfuls of plants back to her house just to extract a tiny bit of resin. It’s probably the same thing she gives everyone when they ache after battle.
Instead, he shifts onto his side to mirror her position, kissing her quick and hard as she allows him to push her down into the pillows. He sees the eager anticipation in her face as she lets him settle between her legs, but it gives him pause. He’s not only in her bed for the sex, and it’s the first time he’s ever stayed with anyone past the initial act. He needs her to know, to see how much she means to him.
She sees his pause, and her expression becomes concerned. “Kurt?”
He finds that the words are surprisingly easy to summon, though there is an irrational fear that she will turn him away, that she will tell him that this cannot last.
“You are everything I want, everything that I love, but do you…In the future, what do you want?”
Her soft laugh is lovely.
“You, you idiot. I love you too, and I cannot imagine life without you.”
The only appropriate response to that is another kiss and, as he feels her smile against his lips, he wonders if he’ll always feel this content with her.
Later, when they’re all packed onto the back of a caravan headed back to New Serene, Kurt daren’t ask where they all ended up spending the night since he locked the door to the only house that welcomed them all.
Next to him, Vasco wears a shit-eating smirk. Kurt wants to smack it off with the hilt of his sword and, by the look on Aphra’s face opposite Vasco, she does too. On the other side of Kurt, Petrus shakes his head.
“Remind us again how the lock on the door broke? Conveniently keeping all of us out for the night.” Vasco’s voice is loud, and it draws De Sardet’s attention from the corner of the carriage closest to the driver. Until now, she had been looking out at the scenery with Siora and discussing the clan leaders.
“Oh my gods, what exactly are you wanting to hear? That we dead bolted the door for privacy so Kurt could fuck me into my mattress all night?” Her words make Aphra, Petrus, and Kurt groan audibly, and Aphra’s fingers twitch towards her gun. In between De Sardet and Aphra, Siora looks surprised. Vasco’s smirk grows wider, especially in the face of Aphra’s glare.
There is silence for a moment, before Vasco opens his mouth again.
“Just so we’re clear, who kissed the other first?”
“Why do you need to know?”
Kurt understands immediately by the expression on both Aphra and Petrus’ face. “It was me.”
Vasco says nothing, merely holds both his hands out in the direction of the aforementioned scientist and priest. Both of them grumble, but each places a small pouch of coins into his open palms.
“What the hell is this?” De Sardet keeps her voice level, but her mouth is slightly open as she looks at Petrus in shock. The priest only shakes his head.
“I had hoped you were the more confident of the two of you.”
De Sardet first appears as though she agrees with him, but immediately she looks deeply, deeply betrayed when Vasco then hands one of the pouches to Siora. The doneigad merely smiles.
“You bet against me?” De Sardet genuinely sounds hurt.
“No carants, I merely remembered when we spoke, that you told me you would stop trying, and wait for him to come to you.”
“I consider prior knowledge to be cheating.” Vasco chips in, and Kurt worries that Aphra will draw her gun and shoot the cocky sailor where he sits.
“I can’t believe you had a betting pool about our relationship.” De Sardet rubs at her temples with her fingers, suddenly grateful that she chose the caravan option rather than choose to walk back to New Serene with this group of schemers.
“Drinks are on me tomorrow, it seems.”
Vasco sounds far too pleased about it.