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Kit blinked; in all the months, years, leading up to this hated moment, the idea he offered had never once occurred to her. That the person on the other side of it might be in complete accord with her.
“I don’t want to either,” she agreed, swallowing down the mixture of hope and despair trying to push up into her throat.
He tipped his head, the crown sliding closer into place, and the corner of his mouth raised ever so faintly. “So, what if we… don’t?”
“What about our parents? They’re going to expect… you know,” Kit stated, as she looked at the man who had been her imposed fiancé and was now rapidly seeming more an ally.
Graydon stroked his chin again, more thoughtful than nervous this time. “How are you at stalling?”
She grinned. “It’s my middle name.”
Letting out a long, quiet breath, Graydon absently pulled the crown from his head and set it on the dresser. Light from the candles in the room glinted off its polished gold surface, glittered in the row of jewels carefully aligned around its circumference. Alone, against the dark wood of the storage container, it appeared delicate but strong, dignified and regal.
Graydon wondered briefly how he was ever going to put it back onto his head.
“I think the more we can pretend to go along with this, the less scrutiny we’ll get from our—” he stopped, reevaluated what he had been about to say. Continued with, “—your mother, at least.”
Kit frowned but gave no other signs of disagreement. “Okay. What does that mean? How much do you think we need to—to pretend?”
He scratched at the top of his skull, his fingers worrying against the phantom weight of the crown. “Well. For starters, I think we should share this room. I don’t know about Tir Asleen, but it’s customary in Galladoorn for married couples to have one bedroom.”
Her shoulders twitched—whether in a shrug or in distaste for the idea, he couldn’t really tell. “Okay, yeah. We do that here, too,” she stated, with poorly concealed reluctance. Which Graydon understood, he did. But also—
“At least it’s a pretty large room?” he said, and then felt compelled to point out, “and the bath is separate.”
She was not, he noticed, at all practiced in keeping her thoughts off of her face. He made a mental note to try and handle any and all future communications with his father. And maybe her mother as well.
“Yeah, okay. Fine. I used to share a room with Airk when we were kids. You can’t possibly be as bad as that.”
Having once shared a room with his own brother, and having spoken briefly with the crown prince of Tir Asleen who seemed perfectly nice, Graydon wasn’t entirely sure how to take that remark other than it did contain less hostility than earlier ones, so potentially a win?
“Thank you?” he tried, relieved when she simply gave a quick, affirming bob of her head.
“What else?” she pressed, glancing away from him as she drummed her hands against the tops of her thighs. Nerves? Impatience? Both? “Because that’s not going to be enough for my mother, trust me.”
Nor his father. Then again, nothing would ever be enough for his father. “Maybe if we took meals with each other? Breakfast and supper, at least? That way we’d each have the day to pursue other interests.”
Her eyebrows winged up as she looked back at him. “Planning on stepping out already?”
It took him two seconds to understand the insinuation and three more to get his sputtering under control to respond to it, “No! I didn’t—I meant—I spend most of my time in the library when I can get away with it! I uh… assumed your chosen activities were more… outside related.,” he finished lamely, because he could not for the life of him at that moment remember a single thing that occurred outdoors. It wasn’t as if he never spent any time outside the palace at Galladoorn. It was simply that the weather was usually uncooperative, dismal at best, and any excursions to the rocky surroundings required a level of preparedness he typically lost interest in the second he glanced at a book or scroll he intended to bring with him.
None of that seemed like anything Kit might be interested in knowing.
Graydon did not know how to translate the look she sent him; it was far more nuanced than the overt glares, challenges, or dismissals she had been sending his way. It could have been considering, it could have been amusement.
Maybe she was just also tired.
“There’s a pretty big collection of epics.” She gave another nod and jerked one shoulder. “You know. If you’re interested in that sort of thing.”
The part of him that found refuge and contentment when reading words printed on a page clapped with glee knowing there was likely a whole new trove of works it had never experienced waiting for him. He loved all writings, whether historical or fictional, real or imagined, but there was a special place for tales of heroics and adventures in his heart. Another point of commonality between them that might help make their situation more bearable?
He recalled one of their first real exchanges. “The story of Princess Taramis?” he wondered.
She gave the faintest hint of a smirk; as if reluctantly acknowledging her prior behavior. “Yeah, it’s in there. A couple of versions, actually.”
“I’ll look for it.”
A wave of exhaustion flooded over him; though ostensibly the last few days had been all about celebration and merriment, he felt like he had been climbing an enormous tree with branches stretching endlessly into the sky and only now was breaking through a space in the canopy to see ever more limbs above him. Wearily, he shuffled toward the bed, optimistic for the first time in a long time that he might gain a few hours of actual sleep.
“What are you doing?”
The alarm in Kit’s voice had him tensing all over again. He froze in the act of pulling back the extremely warm and comfortable-looking blanket, and darted his glance around the room to see what might have been the cause of it.
“Going to sleep?” he offered when he found nothing threatening. Or nothing more threatening.
Her face remained scrunched in agitation. “Why are you getting into the bed?”
He blinked. “Because… that’s where I usually sleep? Where else would I—"
Blue eyes, dark and a little wild, dropped before jumping guiltily back up to meet his. Some tiny, completely irrational part of his brain was pleased that he was coming to understand his reluctant bride so well, so rapidly.
“Did you… want me to sleep on the floor?” he proposed, to clarify.
Kit made a brief noise of disbelief. “What? No? That would be—rude,” she denied, in in a tone that without question said she did, in fact, want him to sleep on the floor.
Graydon might have agreed to do so, if it hadn’t been such a shit day, week, month, entire life and the floor wasn’t hard, unyielding stone and also freezing cold. Besides, the bed was so large it could easy accommodate six full sized adults. An insane number of trees must have gone into crafting it, surely it could hold both of them and their collective struggles.
Still. There were obvious differences between them, even if their current predicament was aligned. Legitimate, valid reasons why she would prefer one arrangement to another. He might have been sad and tired, but he wasn’t stupid. Or unkind.
“I promise I don’t move very much,” he began, in hopes of offering reassurance. “Perhaps we could, put something in the middle? If that would help?”
She tipped her head and he thought he saw some of the rigidness in her shoulders relax. After a few seconds, she stalked over to a stand in the corner near where she stood and retrieved something. When she turned around and stepped back, he saw it was a sword with a red ribbon tied around the handle. Reaching out across what he assumed was going to be her side, she placed it 3/5ths of the way from the edge.
It was more space than he needed and if would make her more comfortable, it was easy enough to acquiesce. The possibility of being stabbed in the middle of night, however remote since the sword was sheathed, didn’t really appeal to him though.
He grabbed several of the large pillows—he could sleep on his traveling cloak rolled up if need be—from in front of the headboard and slowly placed them over the blade in a silent counteroffer.
Her eyes narrowed subtly and then, to his immense surprise, she gave a chuckle. “Yeah, probably a better idea,” she assented, pulling the sword from beneath and setting it back on its stand.
While her back was turned to him, Graydon gave a quick exhale and sent a short prayer of thanks to the Mothers, who never had really shown him any favor before but maybe things were changing?
Cautiously pleased with how the evening was progressing without injury, he began unfastening the toggles of his doublet, fatigue numbing his fingers and making the normally simple task harder. Exhaustion was dragging at him, his body all but demanding he let it shut down for the night.
“Why are you getting undressed?!”
He was so tired that his mind had no energy left to apply to strategy. He had been in his formal wear since early that morning, Kit had changed into looser attire before the feast had even begun. “Because I don’t normally sleep in my doublet?” he groused, his tone sharper than he intended.
Kit bristled immediately and he might have berated himself if he had had any vigor to spare. Her cheeks flushed but when she said nothing in response, he realized it was in embarrassment, rather than anger.
Two steps forward, one step back? For all her bravado and brashness, she was no doubt as sheltered as he. He was a stranger, in her home, and it was clear from every interaction they had had thus far, that while he might have been ambivalent about his future, she had viewed hers with a great deal more vitriol.
“I just—”
“It is rather chilly in here,” he hurried to interject. Sometimes the only way to advance is to retreat. “A bit drafty. Some extra layers wouldn’t go amiss.”
The color remained in her face, but a mixture of gratitude and resolution passed across it as well. She took what appeared to be her own steadying breath and he wondered what mental compromises she was making of herself.
“Yeah. It gets like that. Especially in the winter months,” she conceded, stiffly.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” he replied, deliberately mild as he sat down on the edge of the bed. He started to bend down and then hesitated. “Is it all right if I take my boots off?” he checked, ignoring the potential silliness of the question. If right of approval gave her any surety, then he could ask for permission for a thousand things.
It wasn’t as if he wasn’t used to it already.
She cleared her throat and sat down awkwardly on her side of the bed. “Yeah, of course.” Taking another deep breath, she slipped under the covers and laid back. “The housekeeper, Inelda, hates it when you get mud on the sheets. Like fucking takes it personally.”
Smiling to himself, Graydon tugged off his boots and set them where he wouldn’t trip over them in the morning. Resigned himself to the fact he would probably still trip over them. “Good to know,” he noted as he mirrored her movements, tucking behind his head the lone thin pillow on his side that was not currently erecting a barrier between them.
As he stared up at the wide canopy of the bed, he realized neither one of them had blown out the candles in the room. They’ll burn out eventually, he thought and maybe it was better. The dark would almost certainly bring more unease. And he was tired enough to sleep with the dim light.
Not long after he closed his eyes, he heard the sheets rustling, as if their occupant was twisting or shifting restlessly. And then,
“I’m sorry. For—for trying to get you to throw a knife at my brother’s head.”
The remorse in her voice sounded genuine and the sheepishness underlying the words made it all the more believable. He idly wondered how it all might have gone if they had been given more choice in the matter, if any of their thoughts and desires had been taken into account by those so determined to see them joined. Perhaps they could have started on gentler terms.
Or maybe, if she had known the truth of him, she would have rebelled even harder.
He swallowed the thought down. Now was not the time. “It’s okay. I mean, it definitely could have been worse.”
“How?”
“You could’ve been throwing the knife at me,” he reasoned.
She chuckled again, easier than before and it felt like a giant step forward, one that, if he had been asked earlier in the evening when she had shoved the dagger into his hand, he wouldn’t have imagined possible.
“Also. Sorry for being… weird. About everything.” This apology was more rueful, quieter. He might have thought it had been him speaking without thinking if their voices weren’t so very different.
Graydon yawned, hard enough to feel his jaw crack. “I don’t think you’re being weird,” he mused, sleepily. “Our parents are weird. Who would ever want to marry someone they didn’t even know?”
There was a sudden tremor in the bed, as if something heavy had struck down upon it. “I know, right? It’s insane. Who thinks up this shit?”
“It’s certainly no way to ensure a stable, continuous government.”
Silence descended between them for a beat. “Yeah, that. And it sucks, too.”
He hummed, in total agreement. As sleep edged closer and closer in, he could feel the tight hold he kept on his thoughts slipping. It had been a long time since he had shared a bed with anyone. “At least you have your brother. It’s nice to have someone in your corner, always.”
That’s what he remembered, anyways.
“Right,” she agreed, so softly that he barely heard it. There was an odd catch in her voice, but he couldn’t summon up the wherewithal to question it. Sleep continued to beckon but his mind prodded at him, clinging stubbornly to wakefulness and the solace of company. You’re lonely, it whispered to him.
He searched his increasingly foggy brain for something to extend the tentatively amicable conversation they had going.
“You looked uh… very beautiful by the way. Today. In your dress. Is that—is that ok to say?”
Kit’s response was short, instant, and full of warning. “No.”
“Oh.” Right. He realigned his thinking. “Um… you actually looked terrible then?” he revised.
Silence again. And then the snort of laughter that escaped her was bright and sincere. He grinned and felt like he had accomplished an impossible task.
“Shit. We’re gonna end up being friends, aren’t we?” To his amazement, she hardly sounded put off by the notion.
“Probably,” he concurred, hopeful. “It would certainly piss off my father.”
“Well, that’s a good enough reason for it,” she quipped. And for the first time in years, the crushing weight of failure and inadequacy and disappointment that had been squeezing inside of him eased. Ever so slightly. Giving him just enough room to think, perhaps there was something he wouldn’t ruin. Maybe he wasn’t the bumbling embarrassment his father so often named him.
“I’m sorry you had to marry me,” he mumbled, truncating the meandering speech his brain wanted to give on the unfairness of their state in hopes that it would allow him into unconsciousness quicker.
Her sigh drifted across the bed, full of resignation. “I guess it’s not really your fault, is it.”
Actually, it was, his mind pointed out, but he was already, finally, succumbing to slumber.