Work Text:
Opening his eyes, Claude rose from his seated morning meditation, pushing aside the curtain of his old dormitory. The snow that had begun falling last night now blanketed the grounds of Garreg Mach; the late winter sun was still white and far, but its pointed brightness reflected off the snow, making the sight stark and blinding. He glanced over his shoulder at the stack of papers on his desk, and the book about the wildlife of Fódlan he’d set beside it last night, intending to have the Friday off from paperwork. A snow day was perfect for staying inside and reading, which was usually what he did at the Riegan estate. But the thin layer of white snow seemed to call him outside. And he would prefer to see the animals in the book in person anyway.
Once he’d put on a warm, layered outfit, boots with thick stockings, a scarf and gloves, and a coat, Claude grabbed a quick breakfast at the dining hall—still the earliest there, as usual—and was on his way out when Marianne came in, bundled up so that only her head from the nose up was visible. He made a little detour and walked over to greet her.
“Hi, Marianne. You’re up early.”
She breathed in sharply, but her shoulders relaxed when she turned around. “Oh, it’s just you, Claude. Good morning.”
“Morning. It’s a little cold, but isn’t the snow pretty?”
“Yes, it’s very scenic. I got up so I could take a ride around the monastery.”
He smiled. “Great minds think alike. Are you heading to the stables after you eat?”
“Oh, you were going to take a ride, too?” She clutched her bowl of oatmeal to her chest and looked up at him.
He nodded. “I was going to go for a long ride through the mountains. On horseback. Not on the back of a wyvern. They get a little cold when the sun’s not fully out.”
“Okay. Um, I was just going to go on a short ride, but I suppose I wouldn’t say no to a longer one.”
His heart did a fist pump. “Oh, yeah? That’s good to hear. I look forward to it.”
Not that he minded being alone—he had learned to relish the bliss and calm of solitude ever since his childhood necessitated it—but it was always nice to have company. Especially in the snow, he probably shouldn’t go it alone outside the monastery for that long.
There was another reason that his heart had done a little dance, the way it always did when Marianne agreed to spend time with him. Before, she’d used to avoid everyone, insisting they wouldn’t enjoy her company. But when he was a teenager, Claude had wanted nothing more than to know more about the strange, sad girl whose denials and struggles hit the tenderest spot deep inside him. Though he had given her his life story, handed over as much of himself as he could bear to, something about her still remained a mystery, and that continuous enigma, the air of sadness about her, kept drawing him back toward her.
—
Claude and Marianne’s footsteps crunched in the snow as they walked to the stables. There was no wind, but the bitter chill permeated the thickest layers of his clothes and made him wish he’d worn a third pair of stockings. Marianne had buried her hands deep in her coat pockets. Her cheeks and the tips of her ears, peeking above the border of her scarf, were flushed, the bright red stark against her pale skin.
At the stables, Marianne untied her trusty Dorte, and Claude picked Ginger, a steady and reliable mare. Each saddled up their horse, and then they headed toward the entrance of the monastery. Beyond the gates, the flat land and sparse trees quickly turned into a hilly, densely forested path. The snow lay thicker here, as if more had fallen on the mountains. The horses calmly trudged through the snow, even as the air became colder and colder. He lifted his scarf to protect his ears, and she lifted her scarf to partially cover her head, though her cheeks were only getting redder with the chill.
Other than the crunching of hooves in snow and the occasional honking of a splinter of a flock of geese passing overhead, the woods were silent, peacefully so. Contrary to what others probably believed about him from how talkative he’d been as a teenager, Claude knew when to let silence be just that, and in fact, he enjoyed silence. Marianne not only also enjoyed silence, she preferred it, and it felt refreshing not to have to talk and concentrate instead on drinking in the sounds and sights of nature.
He snuck a glance at her now and then, to ensure she wasn’t too cold, and simply to appreciate the way she hunkered down into her scarf and the collar of her coat. Tiny blue flyaway hairs settled on her black scarf, and her bangs had grown longer, now brushing the arches of her eyebrows. Seeing her in profile, he noticed there was a little bump at the bridge of her nose. He followed its downward slope to where it disappeared into the scarf, and watched intently when she adjusted her scarf again, exposing her pale, dry lips.
He had just turned back to the path, admiring how the snow had frosted even the skinniest branches of the bare trees, when Marianne’s soft voice cut through the silence.
“I think we should go right up here.”
Claude turned his head to see where she was pointing. “Okay. What’s up that way?”
“It’s going to get steeper no matter which way we head. But Dorte isn’t really used to the mountains, and if I remember right, this path should be a little less steep.”
“It’s hard for me to tell what’s what with the snow, so I’ll go with what you say.”
Claude didn’t trust Ginger to be able to deal with any rocks or hills, even if she was stocky and stalwart. He let himself fall slightly behind Marianne and Dorte, and the path inclined gently as it curved sideways, deeper into the mountains. He thought he remembered this path from going on marches and hikes when they were students, but with the snow, everything looked the same. Despite the incline, as long as they stayed on the path’s flat, even middle and didn’t go astray, it was an easy ride.
As the elevation increased, the wind picked up slightly, and white flakes flew by, landing on his hair and face and vanishing into the wool of his jacket and scarf. When the wind settled, the crunching of Dorte’s hooves suddenly stopped. Claude pulled gently on Ginger’s reins.
“Listen,” Marianne said.
He listened. He heard seemingly nothing other than his own breath for a moment. Then, listening closer, he heard the faintest sound, like light rainfall but much softer. It was an ethereal sound, gone as quickly as it came, seemingly eternally fading into nature’s white canvas of sound and silence.
“The snow?” he whispered, turning to face her.
She nodded, and her scarf slipped down to expose a little more of her nose. She did not turn her gaze away from him, and his breath caught in his throat as he found himself unable to look away, either. Her brown eyes were as gentle and captivating as the soft sound of snowfall; her face, rosy with the cold, reddened further with the breeze and the snow pelting it; a piece of her tightly braided hair had come loose, the wind tossing it lightly; and flakes dusted her hair and clothes, melting quickly away. The wind was sharp, real, and raw around him; she seemed ephemeral and unreal somehow, just another part of the passing snowstorm, almost as if he didn’t get off his horse and run over to embrace her, that she might suddenly disappear.
“We should move on,” she said, pulling her scarf up to her cheeks and breaking their gaze.
“Yeah, let’s go,” Claude said, gathering himself as easily as if his heart weren’t still pounding in his ribcage.
The snow picked up as the path got higher; Claude felt the pressure in the air lighten the higher they got. He didn’t even flinch when his ears popped, but the horses seemed a little unsettled by the change in air pressure. He began to wish he had grabbed a hat, but he was glad for the warmth of the scarf, and the warmth that came over him when he looked to his right and remembered Marianne was there.
“Let’s head this way,” she directed, and he followed her off the main path, making sure to stick closely behind her. Somehow, she knew where she was going, so he wouldn’t question her abrupt detour.
“Oh, look at that!” she cried, as the woods gave way to a clearing, revealing a large lake flanked by trees. “It’s frozen.”
“What a sight.”
Claude recalled when the lake had frozen over one particularly cold winter at the Riegan estate. Though he’d insisted on ice skating like he’d read in books, his grandfather had refused on the grounds that he might fall in.
She hopped off of Dorte, landing in the crisp snow with a crunch. “Have you ever gone ice skating?”
“Can’t say I’ve ever had the chance.”
“I never thought I’d see this lake freeze over. I should have brought a pair of skates.”
Claude eased himself off of Ginger, and the cold snow engulfed his boots. “Did you have a lake at your family’s estate, too?”
Marianne continued to look at the lake. “Yes, but not my adoptive father’s estate.”
“So you went skating with your parents?”
“Yes. The last time I went skating was when I was eight.”
“Oh, wow. It’s been a while, huh?”
He still had never seen snow when he was eight. It was only a dream, or an illustration in a storybook, that he longed to see one day. He hadn’t realized it could snow in the northern half of the Alliance like it did. He’d been led to believe all the snow was in Faerghus—or maybe it was just that many of the stories he’d read from the Alliance took place in summertime.
“I wonder if it’s solid enough to walk on,” Marianne said, and she dropped Dorte’s reins and trudged through the snow to the edge of the lake.
Claude’s shoulders and chest tensed as she tested the ice with the toe of her boot. He watched, frozen, as she gingerly, tentatively stepped onto the surface of the lake, and took a second step, and another, all measured and cautious steps. His upper body relaxed slightly, though it toed the line between settled and not, which exhilarated him. With every step, he feared she would fall in, but with every step, her confidence grew, and the warmth inside his heart began to grow watching her walk across the ice. Out here, away from the chaos of a world at war, he thought there was no one with whom he would rather share the wonder of the world in winter.
“It’s completely solid,” Marianne said, carefully turning around to face him. “Do you want to walk on it?”
Claude frowned. “I don’t know about two people at once.”
“I’ll go back on shore,” she said, and walked carefully forward, stepping with only a slight stumble onto the snowy bank. She was still prone to tripping over herself, but he had never seen her be so graceful and careful as she had been on the ice.
“It might be better to step somewhere else so that it doesn’t weaken the ice,” she advised.
He walked around to the side of the lake and took a careful step onto the ice. “Whoa!” He stumbled onto the lake, both hands spread out beside him. “Slipperier than I expected.”
“Be careful, Claude.” There was a note of concern in Marianne’s voice.
He gave a quick “uh-huh,” taking another cautious step onto the ice and then a third step, making sure to distribute his weight evenly with each step.
“Go further from the edge, toward the middle! It’s safer out there!”
He focused on the frozen sheet beneath him. He took every step with bated breath, unsure if there were any cracks or weaknesses in the ice.
“How am I doing?” Claude called once he’d gone out a ways away from the shore. Marianne and the horses were distant now. The snow still fell, alighting on his clothes and on top of the lake’s frozen surface. “Have I mastered the fine art of walking on a frozen lake?”
She giggled, making his heart turn over and a smile rise to his face. If he could ask her to laugh again, he would. “You’re doing fine! Just be careful!”
“You got it,” he replied, and began walking further from her, toward the trees, as the snow continued to fall. One of the horses snorted, and Marianne said something he only half-caught. He stopped in his path for a moment, looking over his shoulder at her, now distant. She was stroking the side of Ginger’s snout, while Dorte looked on, presumably jealous.
If Claude were any sort of romantic, now would probably be the time to turn around, call her name, and confess his undying affection for her, all while standing in the middle of a frozen lake. But that really wasn’t his style; he much preferred admiring her from a distance. After all, it was what he had always done—kept people an acceptable distance away, pacing himself to come nearer to them when he felt he trusted them enough to give them little pieces of himself.
But, as far away as he was, he had never felt closer to her. Now that she knew his story—even if she didn’t realize it was his, she still knew that he understood her sadness on a personal level—he felt his walls breaking down. Those walls were slowly being dismantled by everyone around him, not just Marianne, but her smile and laugh were what truly made his walls collapse, even shatter. When she was happy, when her confidence filled her to the brim and spilled over, he felt his heart expanding almost too much to be held by his chest.
Slowly, he started across the lake, with only the sounds of the snow, his footsteps, and his uneven breathing. He nodded at Marianne’s advice to “Be careful!” and continued on his way, toward her. He looked up now and then, watching her become closer, and when he reached the edge, she extended her gloved hand. He grabbed on and stepped onto the bank, his boots digging deep into the snow.
Claude breathed out, the tenseness in his shoulders dissolving. “Well, that was fun. Certainly a new experience.”
Then he realized Marianne’s hand was still enfolded in his. He looked down at their hands, joined together.
“What is it? Cold hands?”
“Oh! Um, no.” She withdrew her hand quickly. “Sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize.” He bit his lip. Why had he said that? She knew she didn’t have to apologize. “Hey, um, you can…” Why was he reduced to a stuttering mess now of all times? “Hold my hand. If you want to. I mean, if you’re cold.”
“What?” She averted her eyes. “I didn’t mean to. I mean, you don’t have to.”
“Oh, I see. Because you kept holding onto my hand like you wanted to.” He rarely ever blushed, but he felt blood rushing to his face as he mashed his lips together. “Do you want to?”
“Well… Do you?”
He nodded. “Yes. I would love to.”
She offered her hand, and he took it in his left hand. He turned her hand over so that her palm was up, and gently rubbed his thumb across her knuckles, placing the fingers of his right hand inside her palm. Though her hand had trembled when she first pulled him up, the shaking eased as he caressed the outside of her hand, and, gradually, she loosely curled her fingers over the fingertips of his right hand.
Claude looked up at Marianne. She had turned her head, holding up the edge of her scarf with her free hand to hide her mouth and nose.
“The snow is getting heavier,” he said. The wind whistled in his ears. “We’ll need to head back.”
“And we can’t hold hands on horseback,” she said, though she made no move to drop her hand.
“I wish I could stay longer,” spilled out of Claude like he had no control over what he was saying. His heart was pounding in his throat. Longer. Closer. He wanted to watch her as the snowflakes settled in her hair. He wanted to warm her hand between his as he looked into her eyes. He wanted to hear her deepest thoughts and dreams, and he wanted so badly to say the words that clamored in his throat, but they remained trapped, despite his sudden bold streak.
“I want to know you better,” he said finally. “Not in the way I usually do with everyone else, where I’m aiming to uncover all their secrets. I… I want to spend more time with you.”
“Huh?” Her eyes widened, her lips parting slightly. “What do you mean?”
“I want to go on more long rides with you through the snow and walk on the ice. And when the snow melts, we can go hiking, and listen to the birds and look at the trees and flowers. I want to tend to the horses with you, and sit outside at the pond. I want to do all the things you do. With you.”
Her slightly surprised expression softened into a smile. “That’s so…” Withdrawing her hand from both of his, she turned away for a moment, then faced him with a determined expression. Marianne with a furrowed brow—he was certain he’d never seen, nor would he see, anything more precious than that.
“I want to enjoy life, too! I had such a wonderful time today. I want to do all those things, too. And I want to do what you do. Going to the library, cooking feasts, even learning archery and sparring.”
“Everything?” Claude’s heart caught in his throat. Somehow, instead of feeling the old dread rise up in him, he felt light. Would she cross the border with him one day, and see the things that he had missed all these years, with him by her side? Would everyone else follow afterward, and would they be smiling, widely, living happily alongside each other?
She hesitated before adding, “Maybe not the paperwork.”
Claude laughed, his cheeks rising as he did, an unfamiliar, but welcome, feeling. “I wouldn’t want to do it either. But hopefully, all of that nonsense’ll be over soon. What do you say? Do you think there are a lot of long rides and nature walks in our near future?”
She nodded. “Of course. I’m excited to see that future. After the war. Together, with you.”
Claude smiled, looking on her more fondly than she could ever hope to realize. Though his toes and fingers had long gone numb, the warmth inside him eclipsed the cold of the snow and ice.
“Then we’ll make that future. Together.”