Work Text:
Ngh?!
Namaari woke up with a start when a foot kicked her square in the chin. As soon as she opened her eyes, she saw one foot dangling precariously on the edge of the bed while the other was underneath her chin. She began sitting up slowly, still completely disoriented from both the impact of the kick and the amount of sleep she had gotten. Her expression morphed from that of confusion to amusement when she saw the intruder from the night before, half of her body lying haphazardly at the edge of the bed.
At this point, the sneaky binturi is definitely going to wake up with extreme body pain.
Moving slowly to adjust the still-sleeping princess, Namaari began by pulling her away from the ledge. Then, using both of her arms, she secured her hold on Raya's upper body (all while dodging another kick) before looping one arm under her legs, bringing her back to a proper position on the bed.
When Namaari sees that Raya is still deeply asleep, she releases a breath she didn't know she was holding.
Being the Princess of Fang, Namaari was given the privilege of having a grand room of her own, complete with a giant bed and all the best accommodations the country could offer.
Looking around, she could see how much her own room differs from Raya's. This room only looks to be about as big as a quarter of her own. It is pretty minimalistic, only having the barest furniture needed for one to survive.
Though unlike hers, this room doesn't look like, doesn't feel like someone has been living here for half a year.
Her thoughts were cut off when she felt arms circling to embrace her midsection. Fighting off an incoming blush, she cleared her throat and leaned back against the headboard.
"You kicked me awake."
"Hmmm," was all she could hear from the other.
Ignoring the butterflies in her stomach, she brought a tentative hand up to brush the other's hair. When she felt her sigh and relax at her touch, she smiled and began to use both hands to do so.
The moment was interrupted when she heard a knock on the door.
"Princess Namaari, I have come to tell you that breakfast will be ready in a few minutes." The muffled voice of Chief Benja came from the other side of the door.
Namaari stiffened. She looked down at the woman clinging to her before turning towards the door and saying, "Understood, Chief Benja. I will be right down in a moment."
"Oh, and Princess?" Chief Benja started before letting out a rather loud sigh that sounded very much like disappointment.
"Please tell my daughter to stop hiding her boots in the garden below. I somehow managed to trip on one a while ago, and it wasn't quite a pleasant experience," and with that, she hears his footsteps recede down the hall.
Namaari blinked. She closed her mouth, finding it somehow open. She doesn't know if she feels horror (at the fact Chief Benja knows that both of them are here), shock (that Raya repeatedly leaves her boots in the garden), or disappointment (knowing that she has to wake Raya up and pull her out of her grasp) at the moment. All she knows is that she looks down at the very much asleep binturi and tries to shake her awake.
"Seriously, dep la?"
One thing that Namaari has learned so far from the Princess of Heart is that she is a very difficult person to rouse. She had tried everything, from gently shaking her awake to roughly tickling her sides. Still, the log just refused to move from its position.
Giving up, Namaari stood to change into clean clothes behind the rattan dividers in the corner of the room. She at least has to get ready for the day's work. By the time she had stepped out of the divider, Raya was already sitting up on the bed.
Albeit still fighting sleep from the looks of it.
"Get up, Princess. Your father called us for breakfast." Namaari fixes her armband as she moves towards Raya.
"Ugh, I don't wanna," came the reply of the other.
"Come on, con quỷ. We both have our hands full for the rest of the day."
The shorter girl let out a grunt before standing up to open her… empty closet… and opening up a false door, revealing a dresser with a lot of clothes inside.
Namaari stood dumbfounded as Raya picked up some clothes before she turned towards the taller woman, "Now move along, dep la. Well, unless you want to see me undress this time?" Raya all but gave a wink, and the effect on Namaari was instantaneous. She stuttered and moved to the door, stepping out and hurriedly closing it before she could hear the other's muffled laugh inside the room.
So what else had the Princess of Fang learned about Raya? She is, without a sliver of doubt, absolutely childish.
The next time they saw each other was by the riverside. Both were hiding from the scorching rays of the sun under the cover of several palm trees.
Raya came by to oversee how the trappers and fishermen were coming along with the construction of the mud ponds. The Fang instructors were introducing them to the basics of making an effective crab trap. She brightened up upon seeing everyone participating, and her amusement went up even more on seeing the Princess of Fang struggling with weaving the rattan into the form presented to them by the instructors. Grinning, she sat next the other princess, though attempting to take some of the rattan from the other earned her a swat on the hand.
"That's mine, Princess. Go get your own from over there." Namaari pointed at a stack of dried rattan by the instructors before going back to the task at hand.
Raya scoffed before rising to take some for herself, then settling in front of Namaari, her back to the other's chest.
Namaari's stance faltered. She stammered out a nag before slowly accepting her fate when the other girl showed no signs of moving away from her position. She let out a sigh, her breath softly ghosting the other's neck.
"You've been finding ways to worm yourself into my grasp lately," Namaari said, resting her chin on Raya's shoulder while resuming her weaving over Raya's own. "Care to explain yourself?"
Raya just hummed, and Namaari felt her chest vibrate from the reply.
Their position is, simply put, uncomfortable. The pinch of the dry season and the increasing humidity coming from the receding rivers make the air around them sticky. She could feel the air stick to her skin, which was made worse by the fact that the shorter girl is very sweaty (Dragons know what she had been doing right after they separated in the morning), and she could feel her sweat stain a bit of her clothing.
However, they both know they don't want to let go.
Namaari knows that Raya prefers to feel to ground herself. It was evident when the Princess of Heart went to Fang as an emissary of peace. She saw it in the way she clung to her mount when she was moving around Fang. She saw it in the way she held onto the leather strap of her sword when she was stuck in an awkward conversation. Then, after that fateful night, she saw it in the way she leaned slightly towards her, their arms touching, when she was about to leave Fang.
It was a cold night at Fang; the farmers had just returned from their third day of schooling. Namaari was on her way back to the palace when she saw the unmistakable silhouette of the Heart Princess sitting on the edge of the garden by the water. Her relationship with the princess had been professional (speaking only when necessary for education and relief efforts), awkward (both of them tripping over their words as much as their feet when together), but also... tentative. She could tell they both wanted to reach out to each other and finally talk about the past. She could feel that she wanted to be her friend as much as she did.
This time, however, she has to take the first step.
Letting out a breath, she approached the princess sitting an arm's length away from her.
"You know, I somehow hoped that you would find me here like this." It was Raya who started speaking. She looked down at the flowing waters below. Following her line of sight, Namaari could make out a few dragons prancing and playing in the water.
Namaari took a deep breath. She turned towards Raya, her eyes downcast. She was about to say something but stopped herself, knowing that it was futile. Selfish.
Forgiveness is the last thing she would ever ask for right now.
Raya chuckled and turned to face Namaari properly. She saw the hurt in the girl's eyes, probably mirroring her own right now. She looked down to find the Princess of Fang balling her hands into a fist. She let out a huff before turning to look back up at Namaari's face, eager to tell her the things that had been left unsaid between them.
"I will never forget that day. Lives were lost frozen in time, and families had been broken apart. I spent so much time blaming you and the others for everything that had happened." Raya could now see tears coming out of Namaari's eyes.
"From what I could tell, everyone had blamed Fang. I even believed them. Though at the end, when the dust had settled, I realized that centuries of conflict would have reached its boiling point somehow, even with the gem or not."
"Like the others, I just wanted to find someone else to blame. That if it weren't for you, my ba would still be alive."
"And you were right, Raya!" Namaari growled, "You were right to put the blame on me. You were wrong to trust me on that fateful day six years ago." Then she looked down, hugging her knees to her chest, "And you were wrong to trust me again, that time with Sisu at the borders of Fang."
Raya hummed before reaching out a tentative hand to touch her shoulder.
"If I recall correctly, I kicked your ass pretty hard after that," Namaari groaned.
"You don't understand, Raya. I ran. I ran away from all of you when you were all turned to stone. I ran with all the gem pieces. I don't deserve to be hailed a hero alongside any of you."
"Namaari, you came back. You pieced the gem back together. You saved the world. You were the final piece that had sealed the greatest possibility of Kumandra," Raya countered, her passion and ferocity rival that of the Fang Princess. "If you want the truth, Namaari. Back at that day in the throne room I was ready to kill you. I was so blinded by rage that I didn't even think of what I was about to do. I was about to commit murder, Namaari. I was about to murder you." Raya's expression morphed into that of guilt and remorse. Tears suddenly flowed down her cheek. Raya's grip on Namaari's shoulder softened, and she pulled it back so she could instead put her head down wearily in place of her hand.
"You snapped me out of it. It was only then that I realized that I was so, so wrong. It was the same as the day before: people fought for the dragon gem because they don't believe my Ba, and I helped kill Sisu because I didn't believe in either of you.
She reaches out to grasp Namaari's hand, slowly untangling it from their closed grasp before joining their hands together.
Raya swallowed a breath and said, "I can already see that you don't put anymore blame on me. But even so, I still ask for your forgiveness." She moved her body so that their sides were touching.
"I have already forgiven you, Namaari."
Raya put her other hand on top of their joined ones.
"But it will only make sense if you also forgive yourself."
There were many more conversations like this after that. It will probably never stop, no matter how much time passes. But if it helps them heal, then Namaari will be ready to bare herself just so the two could reach some sort of closure.
At least with Raya by her side, she could learn to trust again.
The two of them had been inseparable ever since. The rest of Raya's free time spent in Fang was in the company of Namaari. So when the time for parting came, Namaari stood in front of Raya rather than beside her mother as usual. She remembered adjusting the princess's cape and giving her her salakot back. She remembered Raya moving forward to give her a tight hug. She remembered her mother offering her a knowing look when the party had left the halls.
She remembered how it feels to long for someone's company again.
When Namaari had finished weaving one basket (and huffed when she saw that Raya had also finished hers even though she had the head start), she looped an arm around the other princesses' middle. Raya relished the touch, adjusting to a much more comfortable position.
"I'm going to leave for Talon in three days," Raya's voice said, barely above a whisper.
Oh. Of course. Sometimes, Namaari forgets that they both have responsibilities for each of their kingdoms. They both had just reunited and, in a few days, will have to separate again.
Unconsciously, she strengthened her grip around the shorter girl.
"Well, at least you'll meet that con baby and Sisu again. Is she still babysitting the child?" Namaari brought a hand up to brush Raya's hair, softly smoothing rough edges that had stuck due to the humidity.
Raya chuckled and nodded, "Yeah, it's a funny story, actually. You know, when we were out to get Talon's gem piece, Sisu, in her human form, didn't follow my advice to stay on the boat and went shopping. On credit! The people were bullying her to pay up, and rightfully so!" Now Raya is hunched down, whispering conspiratorially towards Namaari. "A few weeks ago, Sisu was trying to track down Noi around the floating markets and figured that she couldn't reach the nooks and crannies in her dragon form. Imagine the people's reaction when they saw the mighty Sisudatu turn into her human form and shocked everyone." Now she's giggling to herself, "Ever since then, they kept offering Sisu their wares every time she moved around with Noi and the Ongis," Raya relaxed once more and leaned back to Namaari. "It'll be nice to see them again."
Namaari smiled fondly at her… friend's… antics. Raya is an engaging storyteller. She could listen to her talk about the most mundane things and somehow make them fun, the way her eyes light up at the tiniest of exciting details, and how she sometimes bites her lip when the story becomes intense.
Raya was still talking, something about the giant fishes of Talon, when Namaari leaned forward to plant a kiss on her forehead. Before her brain could register what she just did, the Princess of Heart moved up to plant a kiss on her cheek before giving her a soft smile.
Namaari's heart soared; no more words were exchanged between the two of them. A silent understanding between the two has transformed something soft and unsure into something solid and certain.
The Princess of Fang leaned back against the palm tree's trunk, bringing the other princess with her before placing her forehead against the other's.The sudden cold draft that blew over them made her clutch Raya tighter before slowly closing her eyes to relish the moment.
Knowing that no matter where they are or how long they are apart, they will return for each other.
And when the afternoon heat had started to wane, the instructors found the princesses asleep in each other's arms, expertly woven rattan baskets left forgotten on the side.