Work Text:
“You’re working late tonight, Prime Minister.”
Ferdinand jolts, startled. His clock rings out at seven, exactly on the hour; he has missed evening tea and dinner. His eyes have been running over the same numbers for seemingly hours. He can see from his office window that the sky is dark and starry; the fading sunlight kisses the horizon, violet and orange. This survey has consumed much of his day, and he knows this work will bleed into the next morning.
Perhaps it is best to call it a night.
Ferdinand leans back in his chair, bones protesting the movement. “Ah, so I am, Minister Vestra. Please, do come in.” His neck twinges; the muscle feels tender from his previous position. “I must thank you, though. A moment longer, and it appears I would have been permanently affixed to this chair.”
“A shame that would be.” The bored, droll tone is betrayed by the smile tugging at the corners of Hubert’s mouth. In the past five years, Ferdinand has learned to read the smaller signs of cordiality, easy to miss and dismiss. In the past five years, Ferdinand has learned to read Hubert better than almost anyone else, sans Edelgard. To know such tells of Hubert von Vestra - it is an honor and privilege.
Ferdinand stretches his arms overhead, pops his back into a straight line, and rolls his neck from side to side. It catches, the muscles pulls, a sting against the pulse point; he winces.
“Are you in pain?” Hubert asks, upon him in the blink of an eye. And of course Hubert notices the smallest flinch, eagle-eyed and attentive. It would be a humiliation if the Empress’s devoted spymaster and confidant were not to even notice the slightest discomfort. He would not make for a great hunter should he fail to notice his game’s weaknesses. “Did I-”
“You have done no wrong by me, dear friend. Merely a crick. A proper night’s rest - in an actual bed - should do the trick.”
Hands drop lightly against his shoulders. His body, so attuned to these hands, naturally unwinds and unravels until he is putty in those palms, fingers, knuckles. He is the clay on the potter’s lathe, in his hands. Hubert works at the knots in his upper back and shoulders with ease. Stripped of his heavy outer coats and vest, in nothing more than his shirtsleeves, he feels the cool touch of leather through the thin cloth.
Ferdinand hums. “Are you certain you are not of magic?” Hubert loosens a knot at the crest of his shoulder blade. His head falls forward with a groan, and he can practically feel Hubert’s chuckle through those wonderful fingers.
“I’m made of something much stronger than magic, I assure you.”
Hubert’s fingers tangle in his hair, tips pressed to his scalp, and it is bliss. He combs through the long tangles, picking tresses apart, and if Ferdinand had not already been on the verge of puddling into the floor, he finds himself nearly there now. He coaxes Ferdinand’s head to the side, pools all his hair over his right shoulder, and touches the flat of his palm against the slight bruising above his left carotid. The marks themselves do not ache; Ferdinand barely notices them at all these days and - had Hubert had more mind to not bite so low on his neckline - he would hardly think to cover them at all.
Hubert places his index and middle fingers against the pulse. He pushes against them, harder, deeper. Ferdinand catches his lower lip between his teeth, and surely Hubert must know the effect he has on his body. His skin feels alight, his blood on fire; is he not burning through the kid leather of Hubert’s gloves?
Hubert’s other hand wraps around his front, slipped between the newly unbuttoned collar of his shirtsleeves. He teases a cool path to Ferdinand’s breastbone, leaving searing flushed flesh in his wake. A songbird, caged between the bones of his ribs, trills a lovely tune inside his chest at the slightest touch. She beats her wings against his sternum, ferocious and thumping; Hubert must feel her joy, too, there is no possible way he could miss how she flaps and sings just for him.
Yours, yours, yours, she seems to call to the driving beat of his heart. A familiar tune, one Ferdinand knows well. He thinks: yours, yours, ask me and I’m yours.
Hubert withdraws. First the hand from inside his shirt, a mournful hummingbird heart left in its wake. Then the fingertips still dancing along his pulse point. They both drop to his shoulders once more, solid and in safer territory. Ferdinand eases back, against his chair but also against Hubert. And he tilts his head upward, finds Hubert still just as devilishly handsome and charming turned upside down. He smiles.
Hubert dips his head to meet his, but not mouth to mouth. That is never their intended destination. That would be territory better left explored at a later time; when Ferdinand can push Hubert that much more; when Hubert is not so afraid to cross this line he has drawn and redrawn these last five years. Instead Hubert ghosts his lips against Ferdinand’s hairline. A cool sweep of an exhaled breath has Ferdinand closing his eyes. His racing pulse calms, eases into the rise and fall of Hubert’s simulated breaths against his forehead.
Now, more than ever, he believes: yours, yours, please ask me and I’ll be yours.
“Come. I will escort you to your chambers,” Hubert says after a moment of silence. The clock reads a quarter till eight, and Ferdinand cannot believe so much time has escaped this space they hide away in. The empire sleeps around them.
“So that you may enjoy my company for a few merry moments more?” Ferdinand teases as he links his arm with Hubert’s. The ministerial uniform Hubert dons warms against his side, but he can feel the icy touch of Hubert even through the cloth.
Hubert’s mouth takes on the image of a fond smile, small as it is. “Perhaps.” He rests his opposite hand against Ferdinand’s, the one he had momentarily rested over his heartbeat. “Or, perhaps I wish to see the Prime Minister safe and sound in his room, resting in bed and not at his work desk.”
Ferdinand wishes to rest his head against Hubert’s shoulder; he wishes to forego a bed entirely and nestle himself against the sturdy line of Hubert’s frame. Tomorrow, maybe, as they round the corner and halt in front of Ferdinand’s room in the castle. He longs to continue traipsing these corridors, linked arm in arm, once more; twice more; three times; until the clock chimes and ushers in dawn and he must really bid Hubert good morning. Alas, time will not stop for him.
“It seems we have arrived,” Ferdinand says, but still he lingers. He has not prepared himself to let go, not just yet. “You may report a successful mission to Her Majesty, Minister. I have arrived in one piece, safe and sound, to rest in my bed. Just as intended.” He inches his arm out of Hubert’s hold, and he steps over the threshold into his room. The decor is warm and only furnished with the absolute necessities, a far cry from his old bedroom at the family estate but just as homely. “A pity we must part so soon. I do wish I could have you for longer.”
There is a question in his words, one he asks without words, an echo of will you let me be yours for longer. This is a dance they have exacted over the years; a waltz for the two of them alone. Hubert leads; Ferdinand follows.
“Ah, perhaps it wise you be more careful with your words, Prime Minister,” Hubert says.
Hubert paints a tall, broad shadow haunting his doorway. It no longer ignites terror in Ferdinand’s bones - it is a welcome sight. Ferdinand invites him in further, always does, because Hubert always seeks permission for these tiny trivialities. Tonight, he declines. His eyes shine bright in the dim candlelight, but Ferdinand knows he could see them if all other lights were to be extinguished.
He says: “It sounds as though you’d do almost anything,” into the still of the night; into Ferdinand’s austere bedroom; into the four chambers of Ferdinand's heart, burrowing down and making a home for themselves there.
And that is the heart of the matter, is it not? Ferdinand is not able to walk alongside Hubert or Edelgard. Theirs is a path he knows not; one he could not hope to be a part of. He may be a decorated war hero, but his lot in life has not been cast in the darkness. So, instead, he will toe the line. He will light a small candle, a beacon, to coax them from the shadows. He will serve as their lighthouse, calling wayward seamen back to the shore. He will dig and dig until his fingertips bleed, pull them from the abyss, show them the bright and brave new world they have envisioned. He will call them home. He will do -
“Anything,” Ferdinand breathes. For you, he does not say. The words are far too telling, and they know better than to speak these aloud. The walls have eyes and ears and breathe down their backs; the ones who reside in the darkness, waiting for weakness to strike. One day, he may whisper them aloud, but for tonight he settles on a smile and: “For Queen and Country.”
Hubert closes his eyes, a tiny huff escaping him. It could almost be interpreted as a laugh; Ferdinand interprets it this way, anyway, if only to tease Hubert later. “I believe it to be past your bedtime, Prime Minister.” He inclines his head. “I bid you goodnight.”
“Till tomorrow, Minister Vestra,” Ferdinand echoes, but it does not feel quite right just yet.
To let Hubert escape and take none of the blame for the pounding drum-line of his heart; it would be inconceivable. It would be cruel to himself, allowing Hubert to relish in the race of his pulse and the song in his blood, without receiving proper recompense. Hubert remains hovering in the doorway, waiting, or perhaps he is already soaking in his victory. A smile stretches his thin lips, and maybe in this light and in this mood, Ferdinand could say he was fond. Perhaps he is.
He touches his neck, the line of bruised muscle, and says without waver, “I carry you with me, Hubert.”
Hubert lays his hand over his breast, higher than his placement when he bows to Edelgard. He places it against a heart that thrums with Ferdinand’s blood. “And I, you,” he says gently. The gloved hand rises to his lips; Ferdinand shivers. “Ferdinand.”
The damned twittering bird in his chest cries out, certainly Hubert can hear it. His eyes brighten and smile widens. Terrible man, Ferdinand thinks; allowing me these feelings and hopes. He places his own fingertips to his lips, keeps them there until Hubert turns away. Ferdinand imagines a bright flush to the arches of high cheekbones, the tips of ears, down the length of a slender, elegant neck. It is enough to have such imaginings; it is enough for Hubert to allow him his fancies and whimsy until the right time comes.
Hubert melts into the shadows, no trace left, and Ferdinand braids his hair for bed. The work is made quicker after Hubert had untangled the curls. Tomorrow morning there will be more reports to read and write; a new reform on education; a discussion about water policies; a meeting with dignitaries of Dagda. He will have an evening tea in the gardens with Hubert. The tea will be a new blend from a foreign land they are seeking to trade with, and Hubert will allow the pretense of a coffee to warm his never-warming hands. Hubert will escort him to his room; perhaps he will place his fingers (gloved or not, Ferdinand cares little) against him again; perhaps he will venture further; perhaps Ferdinand will touch and push and -
Ferdinand will ask again tomorrow. The following night. The night after. He will keep asking, and one day Hubert will say yes.
He leaves the candle burning.