Chapter Text
Mafuyu also finds herself guarding during the day in the cells a few days later.
It's louder during the day, the people who want to get out scream or yelling or hitting the walls and bars, and those who have already given up just waiting and hoping it'll stop soon so they can have at least a moment of silence.
Kanade is quiet. Mafuyu doubts she ever tried to get put in the first place, perhaps just resigning to the fact that this is her fate.
Or maybe it's too hard to do much with a fractured collarbone.
Mafuyu doesn't care.
Or she tells herself she doesn't. She's curious in all the ways she doesn't need to be. This girl is simply a prisoner from the Light Kingdom. Nothing special.
Today is the day Mafuyu realizes just how much the girl has been occupying her thoughts, and how badly it needs to stop.
Mafuyu looks over at Kanade, once again placed right by her cell.
The girl was already pale, but having not really seen the sun in weeks she looks paler than the heavy snow outside of these walls.
“How are you?” Kanade asks after a few minutes.
Mafuyu fails to really understand why she cares, but answers anyway.
“I'm alright.” Despite everything in her mind telling her not to, knowing that this girl isn't a threat so there's no reason to even ask, she asks, “You?”
“Slightly better.”
Mafuyu is sure that slightly better is purely her collarbone healing. No one actually feels better here.
“You asked me about what I wanted to do last time,” Kanade starts, “So, may I ask, is there anything you wanted to do, if not being a knight?”
“I don't particularly want anything.” Mafuyu answers shortly.
“I see.”
“Though I suppose being a nurse wouldn't be terrible.” Mafuyu adds after a few seconds. She wouldn't mind being a nurse, if her mom didn't want her to be a knight, that is. Even then, perhaps she doesn't have the heart to be something like that. The heart to help and heal people instead of hurting them. The heart to go against her mother and be something else then what she is told to be.
Kanade nods, wrapping the blanket tighter around herself. She's shivering slightly.
“I guess that dreams are simply that sometimes. Just dreams,” Kanade says blankly, not much thought behind it, glancing out of the small barred window.
“Yeah.” Is all Mafuyu can bring herself to say. The girl understands how little can be done to determine her own future. Maybe it makes sense, too. If the girl had no choice on what to do because music was working out, then she would get how hard it is to really achieve your dreams with something weighing you down.
Mafuyu doesn't say anything for a while, and neither does Kanade.
Mafuyu knows she shouldn't talk again, leave the prisoner alone and just do her job. “What happened that made it so you couldn't do music? You don't look much different in age then me, but you made it sound like you're supporting yourself.”
“My parents died.” Kanade sighs.
“Oh.” Mafuyu doesn't know what to say to that. She feels a pang in her heart, but is unsure why. She has no reason to feel pity for a prisoner.
Kanade shivers.
It is cold. Mafuyu doesn't really feel it. Maybe this girl just gets cold easier.
Neither of them talk.
The silence wouldn't be uncomfortable, but it's not actually silent with the sounds of the other prisoners.
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Kanade feels cold.
It is cold, so maybe it isn't wrong, but it isn't particularly comfortable.
Kanade looks back over at Mafuyu, who is still standing along the wall, by her cell.
She wants to say something.
To get to know her better, but Kanade has no idea what to say, or why she wants to know her better at all. Perhaps it's the curiosity about the people that live across that small gate from the Light Kingdom, perhaps she wants to know more about the person who easily did so much damage to her.
Not that it's hard.
Kanade has never been the strongest person, and she knows it.
The more Kanade has been healing, the more she's thought about her fate here, in this cell. If she'll ever get out, or if this is her final place of resting for a lack of carefulness.
Not that you can be particularly careful fighting in a war.
Kanade doesn't like war.
War destroys people, family's, communities, and everything she's ever wanted to protect, knowing what it feels like to lose those so close to you.
“You're the princess, yes?” Kanade asks after a minute. She had been thinking about it, since she had been given Mafuyu's name.
Mafuyu nods. “I suppose so.”
Kanade wonders if her dismissive response is anything similar to the way knight Shinonome takes it. His knighting makes him not really think of himself as a prince, nor does he care to think of himself as that. Kanade believes there's some kind of tension in the royal family. Not that it's her business.
“Why do you ask?” Mafuyu asks.
“Just curious.” Kanade responds. “Your name was familiar.”
“I see.” Mafuyu nods. “But, yes, I suppose I am.”
Something about her tone sounds distant, blank. Even more so than usual. Kanade noticed quickly.
She chooses not to ask why. Kanade doesn't feel as though it's her place to intrude.