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The dark, wet sand on the shore gave in under Simon’s boots with a satisfying little crunch, like crushed leaves in the fall. He watched as water rushed in and the surf engulfed his feet, sucking the ground from under him and leaving cracked seashells behind.
Simon shivered despite himself, and crossed his arms over his chest to tuck his hands closer to his body. The day was cold, and he had forgotten his cloak inside in his haste to get out of the palace.
He could see just the right window from the beach - if he looked east, where the castle rose stark and pearl-white against the afternoon sky, the thick pillars of the South Wing perched over the ocean.
The lights in King’s study were still lit, the tall window shut against the breeze. Simon supposed they were all still in there - his father, Baz’s parents, and a number of councillors and notaries with them; and Baz, too, of course.
He regretted storming out the way he had - his father would have a couple of things to say about that when Simon showed up again, no doubt - but when they’d started bargaining and haggling over dowry and contract terms, and counted warships as if they were candies to be split between children, it had been the last straw for him.
Baz had been sitting there silently, flawless posture and blank face and all, his hands curled tight over his thighs; not that it came as any surprise to Simon. Baz had always been better than him at handling things. He had a facade to put up for every occasion: the perfect heir, the fierce warrior, the obedient son. A small, sour part of Simon wondered briefly if Baz would have played the loving husband as well, for the court’s benefit.
He shook his head against that thought. That wasn’t what he would have wanted for them.
He only wished Baz had shown a little more feeling about this whole matter. A flicker of interest, of boredom even, of anger at their future union being discussed like a business transaction, rather than something to be respected and celebrated.
Then again, Simon could understand why Baz hadn’t said anything; he hadn’t, either. They had no right to. Their presence at the dealings wasn’t necessary; it had been a mere kindness on King Malcolm’s part, nothing more than his regard for his own son and their royal guests.
Disappointment churned in Simon’s stomach. He tore his gaze from the castle, turning west-ward to watch the sun hang like a pale disk just above the cliffs. Sunset wasn’t far now; the heavy clouds crowding the sky were already lined with a soft pink, which would soon blaze into matching shades of gold and scarlet.
But underneath the flecks of sunlight, the sea was a dense grey, tossing restlessly in the bay, and the wind carried the taste of salt to Simon’s lips.
“Hey. Hothead.”
Simon whipped his head back, and his own cloak came flying at him, hitting him almost square in the face. Beyond the wall of rich blue velvet, he saw Baz cross the distance between them with soundless steps, rousing little puffs of sand in his wake.
“I thought you’d forgotten something,” he said, thrusting his long nose towards the heap of blue in Simon’s arms. Simon unfolded it and slung it quickly around his shoulders, glancing at Baz and his unreadable expression. Was he angry? Was he upset? There was no way of telling.
“Yeah,” Simon muttered, “thanks.”
“It wasn’t your best idea, what you did back there,” Baz remarked, casting his gaze upon the ocean, the vastness of it rippling with foam and rolling waves. He was standing next to Simon, his own cape billowing with the rising wind, but he felt as distant as Simon’s home was, far back into the inland, beyond the mountains and well away from the coast.
Sometimes he couldn’t help but think that Baz, with his matter-of-fact tone and his straight face and his stiff back, just didn’t care enough. About them. About anything.
“I guess,” Simon said, letting it sound as bitter as he felt. It would fit the general mood, at least; the clouds were massing overhead, looming over them like dark purple shadows. It might just rain.
“Look, Simon,” Baz began, “I don’t like this any more than you do—”
“What, the sea? I like the sea,” Simon retorted, fighting back the sour taste in his mouth.
The exhausted sigh that came from Baz’s lips was the most emotion Simon had gotten out of him in weeks.
Simon watched him rake a hand through his black hair, leaving a few locks behind for the breeze to stir on his forehead, lazy, fine as silk. He was handsome, Simon thought with a familiar twinge in his chest. Handsome and infuriating.
“You know what I mean,” Baz pressed.
Simon looked him in the eye, anger and defiance boiling hotly in his veins.
“Our marriage?” He asked, if only to see if it would make Baz flinch. It didn’t - not quite.
“Our contract,” Baz scoffed, looking away from Simon, a bitter smile crooking the flawless bow of his mouth.
The truth was, Simon had feared this. He had feared Baz’s resentment more than his indifference. That Baz should hate the very concept of being joined to him for life, even after all those years they had spent calling each other friends, and swearing foolish, boyish oaths to one another, it hurt Simon more than he had imagined.
He had hoped… but hope meant nothing now.
He swallowed hard around the lump in his throat, trying to make sense of it all.
“I know you’re not happy with this,” said Simon, far more quietly than the turmoil in his heart should have allowed, “I can see that. But I thought-”
He paused, caught by a shiver. Baz was looking at him; his eyes seemed to mirror the ocean, steel-grey and wild and immense.
“I thought we could at least try to make this work,” Simon continued, unsteadily, “since we have no other choice, you know. But you don’t seem to want that, either.”
Simon clenched his hands into fists, trying to hold onto his anger even as it slipped away from him, leaving him only drained, like an empty shell.
“I never wanted it to be like this,” Baz said, his voice so thin and sharp, it felt like the tip of a knife cutting into Simon’s heart.
Simon had always known rejection would hurt; he’d just never pictured it could be this painful when it came from Baz.
“I know,” he murmured, watching the sand dip neatly under his boot, smooth and clear-cut like clay around the shape of him. He remembered coming here as a boy; here, to this very beach, with this very companion, and laughing with him as they pressed their bare hands to the cool sand - Baz’s golden fingers splayed wide next to Simon’s, oddly pale after the long months spent back in the Northern Lands.
He wished he could feel that same wonder. Watch their imprints gleam softly in the sun, feel wet sand coat their fingers and smear their ankles and spread in between their toes, sticky and cold and exhilarating.
He wished they could be laughing now, running and splashing after Simon’s lost sock to reclaim it before the ebb and flow could steal it away forever.
He wished for the sun at their backs and for warmth in Baz’s eyes; but all Simon saw on his face now, across the tense lines of his profile, was sheer bitterness.
“It wasn’t supposed to be this— this cold-blooded thing,” Baz said, his mouth a pale, thin line.
Simon exhaled, feeling tired and powerless at once. “Baz, I’m sorry, I don’t-”
Baz didn’t seem to listen. His eyes met Simon’s, stark and crystal-clear against the deep green of his cloak. When he spoke, it was like a spell, cast from the deepest crevices of his soul.
“When I married you, it would be because we both wanted it,” he told Simon, fierce, and Simon felt himself tremble.
“I had this dream- a fantasy-” Baz tried, helplessly grasping for words, one hand gesturing vaguely in front of him until at last, he let it drop to his side. It looked like surrender, and it made Simon’s chest ache.
“You would have loved me,” Baz said, a soft, tired smile on his lips, “the same way I love you. The way any man should love their spouse.”
Simon felt each word pierce through his heart, making it stutter, beat after painful beat. Their meaning hit him like an avalanche, sudden and merciless. You love me, he wanted to say, just to make sure, just to savour it for a while, just to see the truth of it on Baz’s face. And, I love you, I do, because he did, and because Baz needed to know-
“I would have brought you here every day,” Baz said, his voice thick with emotion, “we would have walked barefoot on the beach, and picked up seashells, and swum like we used to as boys.”
Simon could do nothing but listen, astonished. His heart was pounding against his ribs, and his hands shook like leaves in a storm. He could see it, how it could have been for them. He could picture it all too vividly, feel the sun-hot sand scorch the soles of his feet, and the pure elation that came from sharing it all with Baz - the heat, the giddiness, the thrill of the cool waves crashing around them, spraying saltwater across their warm skin.
“I would have stolen your kisses,” Baz said then, sadness and longing mixed in the stunning grey of his eyes, “the way I’ve wanted to do since- since we were little more than children.”
The deep, unforgotten pangs of yearning echoed within Simon’s heart, twisting it painfully.
“Baz-” he gasped, out of breath. He knew what this felt like, had known for countless seasons. Had borne for infinite turns of moons and suns and stars the sweet torture of wanting, of aching for someone, for their touch, for the very scent of them, for their whispered nothings; of nursing that desire in a corner of his heart as if it were a wound waiting to heal. He knew. He only regretted not possessing the words to express it.
And now, now that Baz voiced it, and painted it all in such vibrant colours before him, Simon found himself wanting more than ever before.
Across from him, Baz met his eyes openly at last, stripped of all defences. Simon could only imagine how vulnerable he must feel, exposing himself, his innermost feelings like that, and he loved Baz even more for it. For doing what he himself had always lacked the courage to do. For looking as scared - as fragile as Simon still felt.
“I would have proposed to you,” Baz said simply, as if simple could ever be applied to them. But he said it, nothing and everything all at once, and the mere fact of it stirred goosebumps on Simon’s skin.
“I would have proposed to you, not in front of the court but in private,” Baz told him, warmth and passion soaking his words in equal measure.
He looked so determined - much like a man who thought he had nothing left to lose, and was made reckless by it. Simon admired him all the more for it. His arms ached to hold him; his fingers itched to follow the familiar line of Baz’s jaw, longed to smooth his hair back and nestle themselves in the hidden spot behind Baz’s ear.
“I would have honored your traditions and mine,” Baz said, his long hair whipping about his throat as he spoke, his cape in a flutter around him, “and when you said yes–”
Thunder rumbled overhead, loud and startling, and brought with it the scent of rain, the first vestiges of a storm to come. Even with the defeaning crush above, Baz’s eyes never left Simon. They glimmered, like the roiling ocean around them, only gentle - softer than Simon could have ever imagined.
When you said yes, he thought, and he knew that he would have; hoped against hope that he could still have the chance to stand before Baz and say, Yes, I do. I will marry you.
“I would have taken your hand, and given you my ring,” Baz went on, and Simon let himself close his eyes for a moment, just to picture it, to bask in that vision for a while. “We would have borne each other’s names, for we would be one and the same - standing as equals before our ancestors, before the laws of gods and men alike.”
Simon trembled under the weight of those words, and his heart raced as recognition jolted through him. The vows, some part of him registered, his breath staggering to a halt. Baz was echoing the traditional marriage vows, the ones their countries share. Those were words a priest was expected say over them, come summer.
Simon shivered, his body tingling from nape to toes. Oh, Baz.
“Simon,” Baz murmured, a breath, a choked sound edged with so much pain, and hope, and boundless love, it was almost unbearable to hear. His hand came up to cup Simon’s face; his palm fitted to Simon’s jawline, inch by smooth inch.
It was the first of his touch Simon could savour in months, years even, and he leaned into it, pressed his cheek into the cradle of Baz’s cold hand and watched as Baz’s lips parted, his breath like a shock of warmth across Simon’s skin.
“Simon,” Baz urged, lost in the moment. “I would have had you call me yours.”
Emotion welled in Simon’s chest, a rush of love so strong it felt like it could split his heart in two and bleed through the cracks, unstoppable.
“Baz-” he gasped, grasping for Baz’s wrist with numb fingers. He could have shaken him, yelled at him, kissed him on the spot, anything as long as Baz understood that he, too- that Simon, too-
“Baz, I never knew-”
But Baz eluded his touch and took a step back, mistaking Simon’s shock for rejection.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled, averting his gaze, “I should have told you a long time ago. Or I should have just kept quiet, and let things go as they would. Perhaps in time, we would… you could have…”
He trailed off, and left Simon’s heart to wring in his chest. This felt wrong, so wrong, Simon told himself. He had to tell Baz, and make things right again between them. There was no way he could just let it end like this.
He shook his head, watching Baz in a blur of grey and black and dark green as salt stung his eyes, and thunderclap echoed in the distance.
“Baz, no, I-”
Baz shot him a pained look, anger flickering on his face for the fraction of an instant, only to wither and give way to sadness instead.
“Will it bother you so very much, Simon?” he asked, grief weighing down on his every word. “Marrying a man who’s desperately in love with you?”
Simon held his breath for one long, everlasting moment. Baz’s voice, his countenance, his very features betrayed only sorrow. They bore the signs of a broken heart, of a scorned lover. And while part of him was still reveling in the realisation that Baz was in love with him - had been all along - all Simon wanted now was to fix this. To put a smile on Baz’s face, like the ones he recalled from their childhood, as clearly as if they had only left their games yesterday.
Raindrops came silently, long and thin like needles, flicking the soft sand like wet little pinpricks. They dotted Baz’s cloak and leather jerkin, grazing his jaw in the grim parody of tears. Tell him, Simon told himself. Tell him now. Fix this.
“Will it bother you?” Simon asked, after a moment’s hesitation.
Baz’s mouth curled bitterly, his eyebrows drawn into a frown.
“What, marrying you even though you don’t love me back?” he retorted, no doubt thinking himself mocked after everything he’d said. “Well now-”
“No,” Simon stopped him, “I meant- marrying a man who’s… desperately in love with you,” he said at last, feeling heat spread from his neck up to his face. “Has been for, uh. For a while.”
Baz’s expression changed into one of confusion, and he searched Simon’s eyes, unsure. Simon looked at him, heart hammering away.
Rain was falling steadily now, darkening Baz’s cloak over his shoulders, causing wet hair to cling to his temples. Simon could feel water seep into his own clothes, rolling in tickling rivulets down his neck, between his shoulder blades. It was cold, so cold - but the tiniest glimmer of hope he saw on Baz’s face was warmth enough for him.
“Simon…?”
It was a sound so helpless, it made Simon’s chest tighten, to the point where it hurt to even breathe.
Enough. Enough of this.
He moved before he could even think about it, and grabbed Baz’s hands in his own, holding onto them as if his life depended on it.
“Baz,” he almost barked in his fervour, “I love you.”
Ah, Simon breathed out. Saying it was… liberating. Adrenaline pumped wildly in Simon’s veins, making him dizzy and yet bringing the world into sharper focus for the first time in years. It felt like jumping off a cliff, high on excitement, and watching your feet finally hit the waves, plunging you into blue and green and frothy white. He was feather-light and heavy, falling and grounded, fearless and terrified all at once, and it was wonderful.
At long last.
His heartbeat was thudding loudly in his ears, and the ground seemed to shake beneath his feet; but he didn’t miss the way Baz’s eyes widened, nor the way Baz’s fingers curled firmly around his own, cold and rain-slick as they both were.
At long last.
“I will marry you because I want to. Because I want you,” he told Baz, loud and clear, looking straight in his eyes so there would be no place for misunderstandings. Oh, he was scared, for all of his bravado. His throat felt dry and his legs weak, but he clung onto Baz with what little strength he had left. “If I don’t presume too much, thinking that you want me, too?”
Baz didn’t say anything. His hands slipped out of Simon’s grasp, and cupped his face - and then Baz was kissing him, tipping his head down to press their lips together.
Relief washed over Simon, followed by a surge of pure, overwhelming love, blazing like a bonfire within him. He wrapped his arms around Baz’s middle, holding him close, molding their bodies together until he was sure he could feel the frenzied beating of Baz’s heart against his own ribs.
Eager then, he tilted his head into the kiss and coaxed Baz’s mouth open, shivering both from the cold and the heady feeling of their tongues meeting, hot and pliant and honey-sweet.
He fisted his hands in the damp folds of Baz’s cloak, his legs like jelly underneath him, and when Baz drew back, flushed and out of breath, Simon chased his lips for another kiss, and then another, and another.
He let their foreheads rest together afterwards, contentment settling his thrumming heart.
“You must come from a long line of fools, Simon Snow,” Baz rumbled, his fingers laced with the hair at the back of Simon’s neck, “I have always wanted you.”
Simon kissed him again, cradling Baz’s face in his palms the way he had only ever dreamed of, his skin in a tingle. When he pulled back, a sated smile graced Baz’s features; he looked about as happy as Simon felt, and soft, a new light radiating off him. Simon reveled in it, and in the closeness of Baz’s body lined so snugly with his own.
Baz was in his arms, he thought, giddy with happiness, and it felt more natural than the air that filled his lungs. Baz had kissed him, and he’d let Simon kiss him in turn. Baz loved him, and in the summer, they would be joined hand and heart before their people, and be as one for the rest of their lives - and the miracle was, they both wanted it. More than anything.
“So you’ll stay true to your word?” Simon asked teasingly, threading his fingers through Baz’s sopping hair, pitch black and cold against him.
“Hm?” Baz blinked through wet eyelashes, and Simon felt his heart twist gently again, brimming with love, with sheer tenderness for the young man he was holding at last. Rain trickled in their eyes and dripped off their chins, light but steady, yet neither of them cared.
“You… you will have me call you… mine?” Simon tried, taking the time to roll the word on his tongue, sweet and warm.
A wave of pink spread delightfully over Baz’s cheeks.
“If I can persuade you, yes,” he muttered, eyes fixed on some obscure spot below Simon’s face. Simon grinned widely.
“I am easily persuaded,” he said, smoothing his hands down over Baz’s chest in idle appreciation. Mine, he hummed, relishing the very taste of it. Mine felt just right for this.
“Well,” Baz murmured, leaning in until his nose was brushing against Simon’s just so, “I’ll count myself lucky, then.”