Work Text:
Bernadetta clutched her leather bolero tighter to her shoulders. The Fraldarius winds drained warmth from any exposed inch of skin, and Bernie was not about to duck back in from the window for a little old wind. She couldn’t see the path leading to their manor without leaning out of the library window, after all.
When Bernie - or “Duchess Bernadetta Fraldarius” now - first moved here, the staff gave her space. She could trap herself in the new master bedroom she shared with Felix for days on end. Felix came and went when he was at home. Bernie could seize him for an emergency cuddle, or ignore him entirely, and he didn’t mind. Then, she had the room all to herself when he was away. Bernie could leave notes on a table in the hall requesting things. After a time someone would knock, leaving behind the pot of tea, a pot of ink, a pastry, or the sewing thread.
Gradually, Bernie ventured through the hallways more. The stone walls felt beautifully quiet, built to survive an attack without letting anyone in. The staff never insisted on conversation, only offering a polite nod as they passed by her.
Over time, Bernie’s room expanded, first swallowing up the hall to the library. Olive, the housekeeper, dusted the books on Tuesdays. Bernie loved coming in before Olive started. Olive had read everything. Bernie could pick up a book at random and Olive could tell her everything she wanted to know about it.
It expanded to include Marcus, the butler, who loved growing roses and would periodically leave a bloom on her tray with her tea. He always brought her Albanean berry blend tea shortly after ten in the morning, and Bernie left her door open so she could thank him. Margaret, the cook, always included a note with a treat with Bernie’s tea. Margaret loved playing with new flavors, and she sang quietly to herself while she mixed the batter. Bernie accidentally surprised her in the kitchen. “Music makes everything taste sweeter,” Margaret told her with a wink.
“It absolutely does,” Bernie agreed, feeling it was true somewhere deep inside.
Now, the whole house felt like it was Bernie’s room. No one bothered Bernie, and no one seemed bothered by Bernie.
Oh, there! Felix came into view, with his clean posture and stoic expression. Bernie giggled. Of course Felix draped his light blue coat over his horse. To Felix, this weather probably felt “uncomfortably warm.”
Even better? He hadn’t noticed her yet.
Bernie darted across the library. She sidestepped ancient weapons decorating the room, and slipped into the hall. Olive gasped as she ducked against the wall.
“Sorry sorry sorry!” Bernie stammered as she danced around her.
“Is the Duke nearly here?” was all she called.
“Yes!” Bernie squeaked. She twirled forward again, the staircase disappearing behind her as she flew down each step. Marcus must have heard her coming. He took his position by the door, hand over the knob, to open the moment Bernie arrived.
Bernie had timed it perfectly. No sooner had Felix’s boots hit the ground then Bernie’s arms flung around him. “Welcome home, grump,” Bernie said brightly.
She heard his small chuckle through his shoulder. “Well,” he wearily replied. “I guess I can’t call you recluse if you are already outside.”
Bernie laughed into the white cotton of his sleeve. Felix felt unbelievably warm, like a furnace built of muscle and courage. Bernie squeezed him tightly before releasing him.
The wind lifted free strands of his hair in its fingers. Such a quiet glow lingered, on his cheeks, at the crinkled corner of his eyes, at the edge of his lips. Bernie captured those lips in hers. The leather of his gloves slid gently on the back of her neck.
“So,” Felix drew his thumb in a lazy circle on her cheek. “What have I missed?”
Updates flooded out of Bernie. She charged through them each time as quickly as she could. So and so had this or that trade dispute, such and such transitioned ownership of whatever property. Her day to day work as Duchess, filled with dry but quiet tasks.
Bernie may have broken a record. She managed to get through all of the boring stuff before they had even traversed the entryway.
Perhaps after spending his life there, the grand stone walls of the estate drew hardly a glance from Felix. Instead, he noticed the one thing that had not been in the entryway since his birth: a humble pile of papers resting on one of the tables. “My tale of Saint Indech,” Bernie grinned.
Felix “Hmmed” quietly, gloved fingers collecting them to flip through the pages. Felix never admitted that he enjoyed her stories. Honestly, Felix never admitted that he enjoyed anything. Felix always muttered, stammered or blushed when he talked about anything other than swordsmanship.
But Bernie knew how ardently Felix avoided things he didn’t enjoy. He would only pick up the pages if he enjoyed them.
Felix paused on her illustration. “Why is there a turtle?” he asked thoughtfully.
Bernie giggled. “That’s Saint Indech!” She slid up close to him, so she could rest against his shoulder and see as he saw. “Seteth said something about how Saint Indech very rarely came out of his shell,” Bernie smiled at the memory. “I liked it, so I made up a story where he’s a turtle hiding deep in the depths of a lake.”
“Seteth is an eccentric,” Felix smirked.
“I made the pattern look like frost, if it could droop like thread.” she gushed. She trailed her fingertip just over the design. As close as she could hover without touching them. “I used my sewing needles to press the curls into place.” Her Saint Indech turtle had taken hours to finish. Green, while a lively color, was hard to make magnificent . To get the sparkle she wanted, she carefully pressed slim gold threads in curly patterns into epoxy over the paint, before sealing again with more epoxy. Bernie mostly achieved the effect. Though she couldn’t ignore how some of the careful curls peeled from the page, and others wobbled after they had dried.
“This is…” Felix’s brow furrowed as he looked closer.
Bernie braced herself. “I know I didn’t get it right,” she lamented.
Felix looked confused. “It’s impressive,” he said.
Felix’s compliments were not flowery or excessive. But something in the matter-of-fact way he spoke, with his sincere surprise at her self-criticisms, felt more powerful than any adoring sonnet. As though it was so clearly impressive, he would need for her to explain how she could ever think it looked wrong.
Bernie blushed with a smile. “It’s not that impressive.”
“Those…” His brow furrowed deeper, and Bernie recognized the uncertain pause of his words. He was out of his depth, and it was adorable. “The little wiggles are so tiny. It must have taken you a steady hand and such patience.”
“Is it patience if I just didn’t notice how many hours have passed?” Bernie teased with a blush.
Felix continued through the papers, scanning the words she had written, and her other sketches that came with them. “It’s incredible,” he murmured. “How many different things you do with your fingers.” He glanced up at her, those fiery eyes sincerely admiring. “Your fine motor control makes me look like a brute.”
Bernie swallowed down the swell of emotion. “Nah…” she boxed his shoulder. “You are just a grump.”
He kept her eyes, smile teasing the edge of his lips. How far away his icy glares of yore felt. “I suppose that could be true.”
“But,” Bernie snuggled her shoulders against his chest, drawing a chuckle. “If I ever need someone to stab a turtle, there is no one better suited for it.”
Felix scoffed, but his silly smile betrayed him. “Obviously.” He adjusted so his arms wrapped around her, Bernie settled against his chest as he flipped through the pages.
Ooh. This parchment was new.
“My secret helpers?” Bernie gasped with a grin. “I was having trouble thinking of where to go next!”
This little game started almost a year ago now. Bernie had forgotten one of her projects in the dining room. When she found it in the entryway, a new and mysterious page had appeared at the end. It had to be more than one person, the scribbles were too different, and Bernie was nearly certain they were the staff’s kids based on the doodles. They had the most bizarre ideas, and Bernie loved it.
Now, Bernie left her projects around on purpose. They always reappeared in the entryway, always with the strange and whimsical directions her budding artisans took it.
Five years ago, Felix would have pointed out the obvious mistakes. One of the turtle’s legs emerged from the shell on its back, for instance. Or it might have been the head - the rough circles could have been eyes or turtle toes if she squinted. Someone wrote “majik chikin” that lived in a “dessert.” Now, though, he hid his smile and said a touch too loudly, “I hope I never see such an enormous turtle.” His glove lingered over a crude triangle next to the blob turtle. “See that tree next to it? That turtle must be as big as this manor.”
Bernie thought she heard a giggle from far away. She knew they watched for her to come find them. But, without Felix to offer his “serious Duke voice,” Bernie only heard their little excited whispers. “Of course Indech turtle wouldn’t be an ordinary turtle, silly,” Bernie batted his shoulder. “You don’t make saints out of ordinary turtles!”
Bernie felt Felix’s soft chuckle, but his serious demeanor kept it from his voice. “It says here that Saint Indech grew bored of the bottom of the lake. I guess he’s going to visit his magic chicken friend in the magic, faraway… dessert?”
Another gaggle of giggles, and furious hushing.
Bernie crossed her arms over her chest, grasping his shoulders. “The possibilities!” she swayed in Felix’s arms. “Does his magic chicken friend live in an enormous cake somewhere far away, do you think?
“I suspect the author intended ‘desert,’” The humor broke into his voice. “Obviously a magic chicken would not live in something edible, like a cake. It makes far more sense for them to live in a vast desert, such as Sreng, in an oasis.”
Bernie gasped. “Are there scorpions?”
“Never in a cake I hope,” he replied slyly.
That smirk was about as close as Bernie ever got to an outright laugh, and she loved it.
“Come on, sir Duke ,” Bernie grinned mischievously. "Scorpions belong in the desert! What kind of monster would ruin a cake with scorpions?"
“I will never understand the great and terrible evils of this world,” Felix replied thoughtfully.
“Is that why you avoid cakes?” Bernie whispered.
“One can never be too careful,” Felix agreed. He kissed her cheek, passing Bernie the papers. "You should avoid cakes too, just to be safe."
Bernie tittered, slipping away from him. “I would rather eat every cake I can. Just to prove there are no scorpions.”
Felix smiled. That goofy, toothy smile that crossed his whole handsome face. It sparked in his eyes and dimpled his cheeks. They never lasted long, but Bernie felt time itself must pause to enjoy such a wonderful smile.
When Bernie glanced over her shoulder, she caught the small faces of three kids who definitely thought they were being subtle. She let her eyes scan over them, and they ducked quickly into the next room. “I guess we’ll see what happens next,” Bernie replied.
Felix captured her hand with a glove, sharing a secret smile. “When you have a moment, everyone in Fhirdiad sent their regards with an absurd amount of gifts.”
Bernie gasped. “What did you bring, what did you bring?” she demanded, swinging his hand.
“Well, Mercedes alone accounts for an enormous satchel filled with art supplies of some kind.” Another small smirk, a shared moment only for her. Bernie realized that Felix had his own metaphorical room, and he preferred few people be let inside. It was a room of sly jokes and slow kisses, quiet reflection and gentle laughs. “I talked Ingrid and Ashe down to three books,” Felix continued. “And of course Sylvain had basically a book’s worth of pages where he wrote feedback on your latest story.”
“Where did you fit all of your clothes?” Bernie teased.
Felix’s brow drew tighter. Uh oh. What did this mean? “Truthfully, I left most of my clothes in Fhirdiad. It seems as though I will be back, staying in the same room, I may as well leave my clothes there.”
Something heavy weighed him down. Awkwardness lingered on her skin in the silence as they finally approached the master bedroom.
The instant the door closed, the words burst out of each of them.
“I hate leaving,” Felix admitted.
“I set up a retainer,” Bernie barked.
Silence smothered the next moment. Felix’s mouth hung upon in surprise, his amber eyes wide. “You set up a retainer?” He echoed.
“So next time you have to leave, I can go with you!” Bernie shrugged nervously, forcing a smile. “Surprise!”
His silence screamed too loudly. Bernie couldn’t bear an instant of it.
“There are so many places I want to go!” she explained, grasping his hands in hers. Words poured out. “How incredible would it be to go to Brigid? Petra told me I would love Brigid, but how will I ever know? And maybe we can see Raphael. He said his sister loves to paint, I would love to meet her and maybe we can paint together. What if I could show Seteth my Indech turtle, and he and I can write stories together? And everyone in Adrestia, everyone who brought me out of my shell, they all have their own worlds now. And I know I’ll never be able to go all those places without leaving here, so I should start as soon as possible! I guess I just thought, why not start with Fhirdiad? If that’s okay,” Bernie blurted out. The silence, the silence, she couldn’t take the silence. “I never thought to ask if it was okay, I know I would be intruding. It’s not that I hate it here, I don’t hate it here-”
“Yes,” Felix interrupted quickly. His broad smile flashed on his face, but she saw relief in his eyes, relief in his smile. “I would like that.”
The panic and terror that had boiled a moment ago rushed out of her in a wail. “Don’t scare me like that!”
Felix blushed. “I apologize, I know I am not good at this-”
Bernie jumped up and wrapped her legs around him. “We need a hand signal, something that says ‘don’t worry, Bernie, I don’t hate you.’” Bernie untied his hair, immediately burying her hands in it.
And he said, rumpled and bewildered, “I never hate you.”
Bernie kissed his face furiously.
“I do have one request though,” Felix interrupted. “Can we go anywhere else in this goddamn continent before going to Fhirdiad?”
“As long as you’re there to stab anyone I don’t want talking to me,” Bernie whispered affectionately.
A short laugh escaped him. “Obviously,” he scoffed, before their lips met.