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"I have the face of a young executioner.
I am the last temple,
the communal dressing room
where girls wear nothing underneath,
where you find yourself on your knees
offering up
both throat and key."
— Rosebud Ben-Oni, I Am Your First World Problem
Edelgard had been sitting upon the Imperial throne all day, and her lower back ached. The pain was not helped by her outfit, severe and too-tight, bedecked with curling horns in place of a crown, and crimson-lacquered armoured plates in place of silk. It had been designed to inspire fear, not comfort. Indeed, when the designer had fitted her for the first time, he had tried convincing her to leave herself space to breathe. Edelgard in turn had glared coolly at him, and ordered him to tighten the corset another centimeter. His face had paled. He had ducked his head with a mumbled apology. He did not mention human comforts again.
On a good day, this outfit wavered on the bleeding edge of what she could handle. On a day like today, Edelgard folded herself into it as if folding herself into the brazen bull. She counted down the seconds until she could be alone and shed these layers like a snake.
It took every measure of self-control to not hasten her stride. She could not afford another slip now. She had already forgotten to eat that morning, and had been scolded by Hubert for her transgression, grave as it was.
Her footsteps clacked and echoed down the great halls of the Imperial palace. Hubert stalked at her side, always one step behind her, like a shadow that lengthened in her wake as the sun fell. Even stooped to murmur in her ear, he towered over her shoulder, blade-thin, gaunt, and hawkish. And if she had felt vaguely light-headed before, it was nothing compared to what she felt at his next words in his report.
“The newly appointed ambassador to Brigid arrived earlier this afternoon. And your uncle has delivered you a gift to your personal quarters.”
Edelgard could not help herself; her stride faltered. “What?”
Immediately, Hubert stopped. “Do not worry, Your Majesty. I have scoured it for any sign of tampering or traps, be they magical or otherwise. I confess, I was a little disappointed to find nothing at all wrong with it.”
A small furrow wrinkled her brow, and Edelgard resumed her walk towards her personal quarters. “What is it?”
“A piece of furniture. And a rather gaudy one at that. I would have sent it to the kindling piles, but we can’t rightly refuse it. Not yet. Not without rousing his suspicions.”
“Hmm,” she said.
The late setting sun slanted through the arched colonnade, filtering through the stained-glass windows and painting her in stripes of bold colour. The summer heat prickled against her skin even at this late hour. She could feel the sweat gathered between the wings of her shoulder blades, at the backs of her knees, the crook of her elbows, and the nape of her neck. She had to resist the urge to shrug against her outfit. She endured the heat as she always did, with vigilant silence.
Hubert’s report was, as always, timed to perfection so that it finished just as they arrived at the entrance to Edelgard’s personal quarters. He left her there, not daring to come inside, as courtesy demanded. And he was unfailingly courteous, even when she wished he would not be. She dismissed him with a nod. Servants opened and closed the doors for her. Inside, a half-legion of ladies-in-waiting dropped into deep curtsies upon being in her presence.
Edelgard spared them not a glance. Her gaze already roved around the chamber for anything out of place, but there were no new pieces of furniture that she could see. Perhaps it had yet to be delivered. Perhaps it resided through one of the doors and into the vast complex beyond; this was only the receiving chamber, after all. In times of convalescence or emergencies, she could conduct matters of state from this very room without alerting any scandal. Her rule had not come to that. Yet.
The most senior lady-in-waiting straightened, and began leading Edelgard through the rooms without needing any instruction. Stiffly, Edelgard followed. Being in her personal quarters at the palace did nothing to relax her. If anything, it achieved the opposite effect. She stood too straight, too poised, hands clasped and chin high, as though posing for an official portrait or a new profile for coinage.
One of the sitting rooms had a balcony overlooking the capital, its walls wrought entirely of windows that flooded the space with light and air. She was not led to that room. She delved far from it, trailed by a host of ladies-in-waiting past numerous parlours and studies, past the personal armoury and bedchamber -- the latter spread with a massive four poster bed -- and into the ablutions chamber.
The room was barrel-vaulted and sheathed entirely in gleaming stone. Here, no sunlight could reach. To compensate, numerous candles had been lit, their flames wavering over pools of pale, melted wax. The air was cooler here, but not by much. The bath had already been drawn. Water steamed within the great claw-footed marble basin. A rune at its base glowed a dull coal-red, maintaining the water’s temperature for as long as she required.
Edelgard halted in the centre of the chamber, a streak of scarlet against a backdrop of immaculate white. It quickly became apparent what gift her uncle had presumed to give her. In a room made all of stone, a wooden vanity had been placed along one wall. It was a gilded monstrosity, its panels hand-carved and darkly stained. It would have taken seven strong men to lift, and even then they would have struggled to bear it to and fro.
Worst of all was the mirror perched atop it. Silver-backed and enormous, there was no hiding from it in this room. Her lips pursed. She could see her reflection narrow its eyes fractionally, could see the coldness wash over her face and settle into her skin like a mask until she looked like she had been carved from polished marble -- a statue brought to life and draped in cloth to appear human, always striving, never achieving.
She quickly looked away. "Get rid of it."
"But -?"
Edelgard did not repeat herself. She did not have to.
A number of ladies-in-waiting were attempting to lift the vanity, but it refused to budge. Gold-gilded wooden legs squealed a centimeter across the stone floor. Her teeth clenched. She could feel the muscles strain until her jaw ached.
He had done this on purpose. He knew she hated -
“Stop,” she ordered, and the ladies-in-waiting froze, waiting for her command. “Just cover it. I will have it moved later.”
There followed a collective sigh of relief, then silence. Nobody dared speak without her permission. The senior lady-in-waiting conducted the others in absolute silence. A pale sheet was draped over the vanity, but it was large enough that the legs were still clearly visible.
Edelgard faced away from the vanity. The doors to the chamber shut, and ladies-in-waiting began the ritual of disrobing their Emperor. Edelgard remained standing throughout the entire affair, though she cast a sidelong glance towards the stone seat beside the folding screen. It was almost amusing: after a whole day upon an uncomfortable throne, and all she wanted to do was sit back down.
It began with her cloak. No less than three ladies-in-waiting were required to unclasp and lift the heavy mantle from her shoulders. Carefully they folded it away as though handling the imperial flag, while two others unbuttoned her outer coat to reveal the kirtle and yet more layers beneath. The most senior lady-in-waiting stood behind her upon a stepping stool to unweave the complex ramshorns hairstyle. Even while Edelgard was wearing her heeled boots, the lady-in-waiting probably did not need the stool. Edelgard was short enough to make such things unnecessary.
Even as a student back at Garreg Mach Monastery, Edelgard had used her station to secure herself private ablutions and rooms. Before she had been the head of her respective House, some of the other students found this preferential treatment at best odd or at worst grossly unjust. Rumours circulated. She did nothing to stop them. They suited her. And besides, they soon faded. Few could remember such frivolities now.
There was a moment in the ritual when they all knew the stop, to leave her alone and still mostly clothed. She would do the rest without them. It was not customary. Custom demanded they strip her bare and scatter her with rose petals while she soaked in the water and their ministrations.
Hang custom.
It was not that she did not trust them. All of her personal staff had been hand-picked and vetted by Hubert himself. There could be no doubt as to their loyalties. It was only that she did not trust them with this.
One of the ladies-in-waiting however, the newest and youngest of the lot, did not know this crucial step of the ritual. Either she had not been informed, or she had simply forgotten. It mattered not. She reached for her Emperor’s gloved hand. The moment Edelgard registered the touch upon her fingers, she snatched her hand away and jerked a half step backwards, nearly knocking the senior lady-in-waiting from her perch.
Everyone in the room went still. The transgressor’s face was downturned, flushed and bright with a mixture of mortification and visceral fear at having erred so wildly.
Edelgard’s eyes were cold enough to burn. When she spoke, the room’s occupants shivered. “Leave me.”
A flurry of quiet activity. They moved to carry some of her clothes and most of her armour away, but she glared so fiercely that they ducked their heads in bows and scurried away with empty hands. The door shut behind them, and still Edelgard found it difficult to breathe. She blamed the corset.
All that remained of her outer layers were a single pauldron and the modified farthingale. She hated herself a little for the way her gloved fingers trembled at the straps holding the red-lacquered plate into position.
It had been years. She should be over this by now.
The armour dropped to the floor with the clang of stone against metal. She kicked the hoops of her farthingale aside. Only one half of her hair had been successfully undone, a curtain of tangled white over one shoulder from where it had been tied in a braid not moments previously. Edelgard yanked out the pins and decorative horn from the other side, hard enough to hurt. The dull pain grounded her. She tossed each ornament and stay to the ground as well. The horns gleamed in the low candle-light like monstrous golden teeth.
She was loosening the whale-bone corset when there came a tentative knock at the door.
With a small grunt, Edelgard tore the damned corset free and dropped it alongside the other garments. She put as much steel into her voice as possible. “I do not require further assistance, Bess.”
The voice that answered did not belong to her senior lady-in-waiting, but it was familiar all the same. “I’m afraid it’s not Bess.”
Edelgard’s eyes widened. It took her so long to work up a response, that Byleth’s muffled words came through the door again. “Of course, if you still want me to leave, that’s fine, too.”
Before she could properly think through the implications of what she was doing, Edelgard had crossed the room and pulled open the door.
Byleth blinked down at her, and something almost like surprise crossed her features. It was difficult to tell with her. “Oh. I thought you’d be -”
“You thought I would be…what?”
Byleth shook her head. “Nothing.”
A tense silence fell. For all that she had rushed to open the door, now Edelgard stood at the threshold, unsure of what to do.
As if she could read her mind, Byleth said, “Should I come back later?”
Edelgard opened her mouth, paused, then shook her head. “No. You might as well come in.”
She only widened the door enough for Byleth to slip inside before shutting it once more. She did not lock it. There were no locks on any of the doors in her personal quarters; she forbade them. It was utterly irrational, the lingering fear. Even if it was to lock the monsters out, it felt too much like locking them in.
There was little chance of being disturbed, unless an emergency arose. Her ladies-in-waiting knew better. Not even the newest addition to her staff would presume to intrude. Especially not after what had transpired here today.
Byleth had not ventured far into the bathroom. She stopped by the stone seat strewn with ivory velvet and cloth of gold. The imperial double-headed eagle had been carved into the seat’s low curule-like back, so that it appeared almost to be a throne, a miniature of the one Edelgard occupied in the grand throne room three stories below them. Edelgard had never sat in this one. She far preferred the cushioned seats in one of her sunlit studies.
“Long day?”
Byleth had always been difficult to read, and that had not changed much. One of her hands was resting on the back of the chair, but she was looking down at the mess of armour and clothing on the floor.
Edelgard sighed. “No longer than usual.”
That awkward silence again. It itched at her like a blanket made of rough-spun, lousy wool.
It wasn’t that they had never been alone together before. They had. Edelgard could feel the ring Byleth had given to her not more than a week ago, strung from a chain around her neck beneath the remaining layer she wore. The circle of metal warmed against her sternum. Much as she would have liked to wear it upon her finger, it would not fit beneath her gloves. And she could not risk certain parties knowing that she had a heart, or that it belonged so wholly to a single person.
Her uncle and those that slithered in the dark had much to answer for. She had never relished bloodshed, but a thrill shot up her spine at the thought of wielding the executioner’s axe while her uncle bowed his head over the block.
One day. Hopefully sooner rather than later. But not yet.
“Is everything alright?”
The question jerked Edelgard from her darkly-inclined reverie. Byleth was studying her with that piercing gaze, as though she were picking Edelgard apart into pieces that could be reassembled later.
Edelgard shook her head. “I’m -” she searched for the right word, “- impatient. That’s all.”
“I find that hard to believe. You are one of the most patient people I know.”
At that, Edelgard huffed out a bitter laugh. “If only you knew.”
Byleth’s eyes softened almost imperceptibly. It was so small a thing that Edelgard nearly missed it. Not long ago, even that much expression would have been all but impossible for Byleth to achieve. “You can tell me, if you’d like.”
For some reason that made her chest ache. Edelgard had to look away to compose herself. “Maybe -” she cleared her throat. “Maybe some other time.”
“As you like.”
Byleth never pushed, always waited. The irony did not escape her -- that Byleth would say such things when she herself was the most patient person Edelgard knew.
Byleth tilted her head towards the deep marble basin full of water. “In any case, I shouldn’t keep you from your bath. Would you prefer I sit here? What’s under this thing, anyway?”
“I - Please don’t touch that.”
Byleth’s hand fell without question from where it had been lifting up the sheet that covered the vanity. “Alright.” She cocked her head to one side, curious and waiting.
Edelgard had never been good at asking for things. She was accustomed to delivering orders, or otherwise manipulating her opponents to bend to her will. Fighting a war was easier than begging for scraps of affection from a woman she had pined after for years.
Her cheeks burned. Romance had never consumed her thoughts in the past. Not like this. Now, all it took were a few fumbling covert kisses in the last week to turn her into an indecisive wreck. Kissing Byleth in a shadow-clung corner of the palace was a far cry from asking her to do -- whatever this was. She did not rightly know herself, which only infuriated her all the more.
Slowly, as if Edelgard might bolt at any moment, Byleth crossed the room to stand before her. She placed her hands on Edelgard’s stiff shoulders, a warm, gentle weight. Edelgard stood perfectly still, not daring to breathe, not daring to blink out of some irrational fear that it might shatter whatever illusion this must have been.
“Your ladies-in-waiting aren’t here.” Byleth trailed her hands down Edelgard’s arms. “Would you like me to help instead?”
The very thought made Edelgard’s mouth go dry. She had to swallow in order to speak. She almost made the mistake of explaining that her ladies-in-waiting never helped beyond this point, but cut herself off before doing so. “I would. Yes.”
Wordlessly, Byleth’s fingers curled around one of Edelgard’s wrists. Edelgard did not even realise she had clenched her hand into a trembling fist until Byleth lifted it, pressing a kiss against the back of her knuckles. The warmth of her mouth transferred through the layer of white silk.
She had lost a glove once at the Monastery, and spent nearly an hour anxiously clenching her hand into a fist and tugging down the sleeve of her uniform until Hubert noticed the problem. He had promptly stripped off one of his own gloves and offered it to her with a courtly bow. She had not hesitated to put it on, and as she had pulled it over her wrist, shame and relief had washed over her in equal measure. The rest of the day was spent worrying if anyone noticed the discrepancy in her glove sizes, after which she rushed to the market at the first opportunity to purchase a new pair for herself. She had been delighted beyond measure when Byleth found the lost item weeks later, and returned it to her.
Now, Byleth turned her hand over and gently unfurled each of Edelgard’s trembling fingers. When she began to slowly tug the glove free, Edelgard could feel herself tense, every muscle going taut. It took an unspeakable effort to not snatch her hand away, to not shrink back, arms cradled to her chest, and beg Byleth to leave.
The white silk fell away to reveal skin just as pale, and at the centre of her palm a puckered, circular scar as though something had been driven through her hand. Edelgard could not stop the shaking. She waited for some sort of reaction, some noise or comment, but Byleth gave away nothing. Long cool fingers stroked along the lines of Edelgard’s palm, moving up to push aside the fabric of her long sleeve and reveal the uneven bands of scar tissue around her wrist, borne from years of chafing against the manacles that had bound her underground.
Byleth dropped the glove to the floor. The other soon followed. Edelgard’s sleeves were billows of snowy cotton without the constraints of her armour, and Byleth unbuttoned them until they could be folded neatly back up to the elbow. The scars that extended all up Edelgard’s forearms were too uniform, too precise to be anything but deliberate. Byleth’s fingertips ghosted along the patterns of ropey scar tissue. She stopped when Edelgard flinched from the touch at the sensitive crook of her elbow.
“Is this alright?” Byleth murmured.
Edelgard had to swallow down the lump in her throat, and still her words held a rasping burr. “Yes. I’m just - I’m not used to being touched.”
Or seen. She spent most of her life clad in irons or in steel. The only skin she showed to the world was her face and the unblemished top of her spine.
Byleth’s hands fell, and for a brief panicked moment Edelgard feared she may have given the impression she neither liked nor wanted this. Her mouth dropped open to speak, but words failed her when Byleth sank to her knees and placed a hand to the back of Edelgard’s leather-clad calf.
“May I?”
Edelgard did not trust herself to form words. Her only answer was to lift her heel from the ground, and allow Byleth to slowly work the knee-high kidskin boot from her leg, like peeling the rind of a fruit. Edelgard lost a bit of height with one boot gone. She sucked in a sharp inhalation when Byleth’s thumb stroked gently against the damp cotton stocking at the hollow of her ankle.
Byleth did not rush through anything. It seemed to take an age for the second boot to slip free. The only thing Edelgard could hear was her own uneven breathing. One of the flames on the opposite wall sputtered upon the wick, and Byleth reached beneath the hem of Edelgard’s frock for the clasp that held the stocking against her upper thigh.
Edelgard temporarily forgot how to breathe, and she did not even have the excuse of the corset anymore.
When undressing herself after her ladies-in-waiting had departed, Edelgard never gave any thought to ceremony. Undressing and bathing were and always had been exercises in shame. She would race to cover herself up once more, barely drying herself off before yanking a clean frock on, the dry cotton clinging to her still wet silhouette.
Byleth’s hands, roughened with callouses, brushed against the naked skin of her inner thigh, and Edelgard had to steady herself by gripping Byleth’s shoulder, tight. Of all the acts Edelgard had heard about or read about occurring between two people, this felt by far the most intimate. Byleth on her knees, revealing Edelgard piece by excruciating piece. By the time Byleth had dragged the stockings down her legs, Edelgard was clutching her shoulders like a lifeline, biting her lower lip, and praying for buoyancy in a sea of drowning heat.
The scars stretched all along the column of Edelgard’s legs, terminating with the same circular scars at the tops of her feet as were in the palm of her hands, as though she had been affixed to a wooden structure by iron nails. Edelgard had screwed her eyes shut, trying to imagine she was not trapped in a room that felt too far underground to be located four stories in the air.
Byleth’s shoulders gave way beneath her grip, and suddenly Edelgard had nothing to hold onto. There was a soft touch at the top of her foot. A hiss escaped her, and her eyes snapped open to find Byleth bowed and pressing a kiss to her ankle, where a pink line was scored into her skin. Byleth’s mouth followed the scar up, up, all along her calf and to the curve of her knee, until Edelgard had to clench her teeth to keep a whimper from escaping.
Her frock was still partially laced shut, but it had slipped down one shoulder to reveal a network of scars. They intersected at the base of her sternum, branching out from her heart like the boughs of a tree, apple-red, or perhaps like a nest of serpents curling ‘round.
Byleth paused to speak, and her words tickled against the skin of Edelgard’s thigh. “You’re so beautiful.”
“Praise isn’t really necessary,” Edelgard gasped.
“Would you like me to stop?”
“No.”
Byleth hummed a wordless note. For a moment she said nothing. Her fingers stroked along the webbing of scar tissue as if in admiration.
“I’m so glad,” Byleth whispered, her words slightly muffled against Edelgard’s leg. “I’m so glad you let me in.”
She was not speaking of this room alone. Edelgard’s fingers curled in her lash-dark hair. Byleth worked the frock over Edelgard’s hips, and pinned the fabric at her waist with her hands. The heat was suffocating. It must have been the marble tub still filling the air with drifts of steam, like eddies of water until the entire chamber seemed submerged. Edelgard could feel the flush darkening her skin, mottling her cheeks and neck a rosy hue.
Byleth kissed the notch in her hip, and Edelgard tightened her grip. One of Byleth’s hands trailed down to nudge aside one of Edelgard’s legs, a gentle encouragement to widen her stance. The frock draped across the backs of her knees. Edelgard felt a sense of unreality as she bent one knee to lift her foot just slightly off the floor.
It was difficult to remain still, when Byleth’s head moved between her legs. Her hands were fists against the back of Byleth’s head, holding her in place. The rest of the room might as well have not existed; it faded into a vast expanse of white marble and white noise. Edelgard hardly registered the echo of her own harsh panting. Byleth’s mouth was a constant heat, warm tongue moving ceaselessly against her. Edelgard squeezed her eyes shut so she would not have to see her own scarred legs bracketing Byleth’s black-clad shoulders.
She could not stop the jerk of her hips with every slow swipe of Byleth’s tongue, accompanied by a sharp gasp encloistered behind clenched teeth. They were enshrined in a golden-tinged mist that rolled about their ankles from a bath filled with holy water to anoint the last Emperor of Adrestia. Edelgard had never been one for prayer -- not for many years now -- but the sounds that escaped her could only be described as wordless pleas, until she came with a stifled cry.
When Edelgard’s thighs began to tremble, and she was half bowed and shaking, Byleth pulled away. Edelgard nearly staggered upon unsteady legs, but caught herself against Byleth’s shoulders. Byleth remained kneeling on the floor. It could not have been comfortable. The stone must have been cutting into her knees.
“Wh-What -?” Edelgard rasped. “What brought this on?”
Byleth hummed against Edelgard’s inner thigh. “Do I need a reason to want you?”
Swallowing thickly, Edelgard opened her eyes. Byleth’s cheeks were flushed, her mouth slick. A curl of dark hair was plastered to the side of her neck. For all that, her gaze was steady, focused.
Edelgard frowned. “You are awfully cool about this.”
“You’re wrong.” Byleth teased the skin of Edelgard’s thigh between her teeth. “I’m so nervous.”
Edelgard’s breath caught in her chest. “You could have fooled me.”
“Could I?” One of Byleth’s hands still cradled the back of Edelgard’s knee. Edelgard twitched when she traced a senseless pattern there with her fingertips. “I thought you might prefer me like this, based on your reactions this last week.”
“What do you -?”
Edelgard did not finish that sentence. She had hoped Byleth would not notice how she had shied away anytime she tried removing her gauntlets and gloves. How convenient it was that they never had a moment of time to spend along together. How Edelgard always had some important duty she had to attend to without delay when their kisses had grown too heady.
“Was I wrong?”
It took Edelgard a moment to reply. “No. But is this what you want?”
The corner of Byleth’s lips twitched in a small smile. “You’re here, aren’t you?”
Edelgard gave a fistful of Byleth’s hair an admonishing little tug. “So flippant for one on their knees.”
That earned a soft laugh against her hip. Byleth grinned into her stomach, then rose to her feet. "Shall I bathe you as well?"
A thrill of fear shot down Edelgard's spine. "No," she said too quickly and too harshly. Angling her body away, she smoothed the frock about her knees once more, and added, "What I mean to say is: I would prefer you join me, instead."
Byleth’s expression softened. “I’d like that.”
The moment Byleth reached for the stays of her own outfit, Edelgard averted her gaze. Watching her undress felt too sacred to witness. She fumbled with the last laces of her frock before pulling it over her head. The ring she left hanging around her neck on its chain. She never took it off, even while sleeping. She did not look around while Byleth continued to disrobe -- bits of armour and cloth falling to the floor in heaps of black silk, black gorget, black breastplate. Instead, Edelgard hoisted herself into the bath using the stepping stool left behind by her senior lady-in-waiting.
The water lingered on the border of too hot. She slipped beneath the surface regardless, ignoring the way her skin prickled and reddened. Her pale hair darkened to an aged ivory in the water, and she hastily doused her head. As she rose back to the surface, Edelgard wiped the water from her face, raking a hand through her hair just as Byleth was using the stepping stool to join her.
The basin was enormous. It would easily accommodate three or four people. Normally, Edelgard huddled in one corner as though it had been partitioned off like the chamber of a heart, or perhaps like a cell, inviolable. On the other hand, Byleth sprawled, her arms propped against the sides of the marble walls, and her legs extended so that they encroached upon Edelgard’s usual empty space. Slowly, Edelgard allowed her own legs to stretch out. While there was enough space they could have not touched at all, Byleth purposefully tangled their legs together and ran her foot along the back of Edelgard’s naked calf.
The water was murky with suds and fragrant oils. A few flower petals drifted between them, gathering at the edges of the basin. Byleth rubbed one white rose petal between thumb and forefinger. “I’ve never had a bath quite as nice as this before.”
“Mmm,” was Edelgard’s non-committal reply. Her mouth thinned. She had told Bess that she wanted no fanfare whatsoever where her baths were concerned. Scented oils were one thing, but flower petals were beyond the pale.
Byleth was watching her curiously. She was mostly obscured by refractions in the water, but Edelgard’s gaze drifted down nonetheless. Edelgard would never understand how someone could be so confident in nothing but their own skin.
“I feel I owe you an apology.”
Byleth cocked her head. “What for?”
“Being so -” Edelgard flicked a rose petal away from herself, her nose wrinkled. “- unavailable.”
“You don’t need to apologise for that. I know you’re busy.”
“Yes, but I want to make time for you. For us.”
There was something vaguely guilty in the way Byleth toyed with a lock of her own water-darkened hair. “I may have asked Hubert about your schedule in order to find out when would be the best time to -”
Edelgard’s eyes widened. “You -? You mean you told him that this was what you were going to -?”
“What? No!” Byleth sat up straighter in the bath, sending ripples throughout the water. “I just wanted to know when you might be free without bothering you.”
With a sigh, Edelgard tipped her head back so that her neck rested against the lip of the basin. “I am sure he has already put two and two together. It’s not like I have been particularly circumspect about us. Not as much as I should have, anyway.”
Byleth’s eyes were dark and intense. “I trust that he would never let anyone do anything that was against your best interests. Not even me.”
“Some people might say that sort of presence in one’s life is stifling and unhealthy.” And though Edelgard drawled, her mouth was quirked in a fond smile.
“If Hubert thought his presence was detrimental to your health, he would fling himself off the highest tower in the capital.”
Edelgard made a face. “I really should talk to him about that.”
Byleth grinned. “Face it, El: he’s a lost cause.”
The use of her family pet name still sent a flood of warmth rushing through her that had nothing to do with the heat of the bath. Edelgard could feel her shoulders relax incrementally. “You’re probably right.”
The silence that settled over them lacked the stiffness that had been present before. Edelgard looked on indulgently while Byleth gathered as many rose petals as she could. She even sent a few drifting along in Byleth’s direction with a flutter of her fingers against the surface of the water.
Not once did Byleth mention the scars. She had her own, after all, though none as extensive or deliberately placed as Edelgard’s. Hers were little nicks and cuts from years of mercenary work in the field, where access to the healing arts were far less easy to come by than they were in monasteries or palaces. Indeed, Byleth never once mentioned any aspect of Edelgard’s odd behaviour.
It could not have been a lack of interest. Edelgard could see those dark eyes following the complex patterns of scar tissue. She could remember the way Byleth had lavished physical attention upon them not moments ago; the phantom touch of her mouth made Edelgard shiver at the mere memory.
She wanted to know the story behind every sword, every arrow or dagger that had marked Byleth’s skin. The desire for that intimacy of knowledge washed over her like the tide. It was suddenly, urgently important that Byleth know something about her that others did not -- not even Hubert -- and the words spilled from her like a confessional.
“When I was in captivity,” Edelgard grimaced even as she said it; she hated nothing so much as being akin to a songbird behind bars, “there were very few avenues of resistance I could employ. I tried them all. Refusing to sit still during procedures. Refusing to perform tasks. Refusing to eat. Refusing to bathe. They made me, of course. Eventually.”
Force-feeding was a less than pleasant experience; Edelgard did not try that for long. The last of the list had persisted for weeks, however. At least, until her uncle finally ordered her to be bathed by guardsmen. They stripped her and dunked her in freezing water, their hands rough, pushing her head beneath the surface until she thrashed and came up gasping, half-drowned and shivering. After that incident, she was treated to sumptuous bath experiences by ladies-in-waiting -- their tongues all cut out, so they could not speak to her or of her -- as though her uncle were trying to train a dog with the lash and sweets both.
Edelgard was studying the ripples her hand made across the surface of the water. She did not have the courage to look up when Byleth asked, “And did they...do anything else?”
At that, Edelgard snorted with wry laughter. “Nothing like what you’re thinking, no. I was too valuable a prize to be ‘sullied’ so to speak. Especially when they planned to stud me like a virginal mare. I imagine they still entertain such schemes."
Truth be told, one of the guards had dared to peek over his shoulder once while she disrobed. Her uncle had slit his throat. The blood had trickled across the stone floor until it lapped against her feet like the tide against the shore. She had tread bloody footsteps all the way to the bath. The water had lathered, pink and foamy, around her until she could not tell if it was the heat that dyed her skin a blushed coral, or something else.
She dared to glance up now, and an awful chill washed over her. “Please don’t look at me like that.”
Byleth averted her eyes, choosing instead to scatter the petals she had gathered together like a white cloud. They skimmed across the water in every direction. “I really am looking forward to killing them once and for all.”
Edelgard managed a grim smile. “That makes two of us.”
Shaking her head, Byleth dipped her head beneath the water and began to lather her hair clean with a bar of flawless, ivory soap upon a silvered dish that Edelgard knew from experience smelled of cloves and fresh rainfall. She waited patiently for Byleth to finish, at which point Byleth scooted the soap along the floor of the basin towards her.
Edelgard cleaned herself as she always did: with brisk and thorough efficacy. Suds clung to the raised ridges of her scars with every pass of the soap, bringing them into sharper relief against her pale skin. By the time she was finished however, Byleth had tilted her head back, her throat and chest bared. Edelgard was loath to hurry her; not when Byleth looked so at peace.
She thought of all the ways it could have gone wrong. How much she had lost. How much more she could have lost. Not just kingdoms. Worse than nations. What she clung to -- a dog worrying a bone, lock-jawed and drowning -- but what still slipped away.
But for now, in this moment, at least she had this. The past she arrayed like a fan of knives, placing each memory with the blade pointed away as if in the hope they would not cut, and all the while her hands bled.
“Look at my hands,” Byleth had lifted her arms to inspect her hands above the water. “I look like I’ve been pickled in brine.”
In surprise, Edelgard glanced down at her own hands to find that her fingertips had gone pink and wrinkled from exposure to the water. She could not remember that happening since -- well, since before she had been forced to undertake the Crest procedures. She always took baths quickly, never lingering longer than absolutely necessary.
“We should probably get out,” Byleth said even as she closed her eyes and sank down a little further, so that the water reached her neck. The motion meant their legs were entangled more fully together. Edelgard could feel a naked ankle rub against her outer hip.
It was distracting enough to make Edelgard’s breath hitch. She let her hand wander down to stroke lightly against Byleth’s knee, watching for any reaction this might illicit. Byleth opened one eye, and flexed her leg beneath Edelgard’s touch.
For now, those who lingered in the shadows could wait. She had far better prospects in her immediate future.
Edelgard patted Byleth’s knee, then rose, dripping, to her feet. “Come along, then. Let us repair to another room.”
“Any room in particular?” Byleth asked, standing to follow.
Fluffy white towels were neatly folded into cubby holes inset along one wall. Edelgard crossed over to grab a few, one of which she tossed in Byleth’s direction. “I know of at least one that has a rather spectacular bed, if I do say so myself. And I know that of the two of us, only one has been properly taken care of this evening, which is -- quite frankly -- grossly unjust.”
“How very charitable of Your Majesty.”
Towel wrapped around herself, Edelgard strode over to Byleth. She had to rise up on her toes to kiss her, but by the time they parted, Byleth’s spine had bowed to accommodate her. Edelgard teased her thumb against Byleth’s lower lip, and murmured, "Let it not be said that I am not a generous Emperor."